A Reaper Made by Liz Long Page B

up; I forced myself to remain unmoving, resisting the urge to brush it out of my eyes. The unrelenting wind picked up. My eyes squeezed shut to avoid dust and my mouth clamped tight so I didn’t choke on it.  
    The dust fell again and I snuck a peek. Everything looked normal, minus Tessa beaming at me. I looked down at my hands and frowned. That was weird. My skin had a strange sheen to it. I reached for the ends of my hair, finding nothing. I finally found short strands, my fingers raking through the odd feel of it.  
    “I can still see you underneath the glamour, but it’s a good spell. Only Reapers and the most powerful supes will see you for real,” Tessa said, pride in her voice. “Look, you can see yourself in a mirror.”  
    Reapers usually avoided appearing in mirrors or photos (I mean, how would anyone feel if they saw one of us in their bathroom selfie late at night?). I hadn’t thought about or seen my appearance since I was alive, as Tully forbade it.  
    Eagerly, I went to Tessa’s bathroom. My reflection was nothing like my real self. Instead of my dark hair, brown eyes, and pink nursing scrubs, I now resembled a stranger - a young college student. Blue eyes accompanied a bleached blonde pixie cut; Tessa had even included a half-sleeve of colorful tattoos on my left arm. I looked about as far from Grace as a girl could be. I tested out facial expressions. When I smiled, my reflection also grinned, though she looked far more mischievous.  
    Tully appeared in the doorway to observe us. He stroked the end of his red beard in thought, but remained quiet, letting Tessa take the reigns.  
    “Your glamour is solid, but at the twenty-four hour mark, you’ll automatically look like you again,” Tessa said. “While I doubt we’ll be apart that long, I’d be keeping an eye on the clock and be ready to turn invisible, otherwise you’ll be Grace again.”  
    “And then we check Ally into the nuthouse,” I muttered.
    “More or less.”  
    “How human am I exactly? I can’t, ya know, die again, can I?” I asked, toying with the ends of my short hair.  
    Tessa shook her head. “You’re technically still dead. You can touch and smell and taste just like before. It’s powerful enough that you might be able to feel physical pain, though.”  
    As though to be sure, she leaned over and pinched my arm. I jerked back, the skin sore from her nimble fingers.  
    “Terrific,” I mumbled. “No getting into cars then, that’ll just send me into a nervous breakdown.”  
    Tully grimaced and opened his mouth to protest once more, but Tessa quickly spoke over him. “You ready?”
    Tully frowned, but I pretended not to notice. I had bigger things to worry about than a little twitch of pain. Tessa’s spell had worked. Now I had to work up the nerve to talk to my sister after being dead for three years.  

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

    “Now remember, you’re Evie and like Allison, from Richmond, Virginia,” Tessa told me as she tightened her ponytail.  
    We headed to the library to meet Allison, a short walk across the green campus. I caught myself marveling every few moments at the sights. Students crowded around the student union, some inside for food while others had formed groups outside in the warm sunshine. Skateboarders and bikers whizzed past us, though there were plenty of pedestrians, too. I’d spent so much time in the retirement home that I’d almost forgotten that life could be so exuberant.  
    “And who are you?”  
    “I’m Tessa from Salem, duh,” she said with a wink. “Virginia, that is.”  
    I rolled my eyes at her and she laughed. The library’s triangular roof came into view and my smile dropped. I was about to talk to my little sister, my best friend, face to face for the first time in three years. I had to pretend we were strangers and somehow coax information from her. How did I do that?  
    “We’re not going to become such close friends that she believes me when I say her