Jay looked at a sign nearby. "‘Capybara,’" he read.
"Too small."
"It’s the world’s largest rodent."
"Good for the capybara. I hope it has a coffee mug that says so. I’m not putting my mouth on it."
They continued down the winding path, peering into the dark, quiet habitats. Doug sang under his breath, "‘What the world…needs now is love, sweet love. It’s the only thing that there’s just…too little of’—Oh, great. Perfect."
"What?"
"Why can’t I have a good song stuck in my head?"
"My uncle doesn’t like people messing with the radio. He says he has it just how he likes it."
"It’s a terrible song."
Jay shrugged.
"No, seriously," said Doug. "It’s stupid. I mean, love is the only thing that there’s too little of? What about…uh…coal? Or trees?"
"‘Jaguarundi.’"
"What?"
"‘Jaguarundi,’" said Jay, reading a sign. "They’re endangered."
"Right, see?" said Doug. He looked at the sign. "I probably shouldn’t feed on something endangered, right? Plus it’s too small."
"How about the…Bornean bearded pig?"
"No."
"It’s over three hundred pounds," said Jay. "It’ll be okay."
"No. I…" Doug searched for the right words. "I don’t want you to think I…this is going to sound kind of weird, but…"
Jay looked up at him.
"I was hoping for something a little more…sexy," said Doug.
"Sexy?"
"Not actually sexy! Not, like, I’m into animals or anything. Just…it’s bad enough I have to drink from an animal in the first place, you know? There has to be something more…elegant than the whatever bearded pig."
Jay read the next sign.
"What about the ‘Southern bush pig’?" he asked. "That’s sexier, right?"
"You really don’t know the answer to that question, do you?"
Jay blushed the color of raw meat. Doug had to look away. An awkward moment passed between them like a cripple.
"At home you feed on cows," said Jay finally. "Cows are sexy?"
"No, it’s all…In my head the blood drinking is about either romance or food. It’s complicated. The perfect animal…would be, like, a real pretty doe."
"Or a unicorn," said Jay.
"Don’t be stup—" Doug began. "Okay, yes. Or a unicorn. But this zoo doesn’t have any unicorns, and I don’t know if a doe weighs enough. I might kill it."
"A tiger?"
"It might kill me."
"Um," said Jay, casting about for an idea. "Ooh! This way."
"A panda?"
"Sure," said Jay. "It’s at least sexier than those pigs, right? And it’s big and gentle. They’re like huge babies."
"Huge bear-shaped babies." Huge, endangered bear-shaped babies, Doug realized with a pang. But what with all the bamboo-eating and never-mating-in-captivity, he thought they might be endangered because they were just kind of stupid.
"Yeah, but they’re not really bears, are they? I think they’re more closely related to the raccoon or something," said Jay, but he didn’t look sure.
The raccoon comment was undoubtedly meant to reassure Doug, but it only made him think of rabies and bandit faces and those sharply determined little hands. He leaned forward, his stomach against the railing, and searched the enclosure.
"I don’t see it," he said.
"They probably have someplace in there where she stays at night," Jay said, pointing to a sort of cave opening in the back wall.
Doug stared at the cave. A light breeze tickled his skin and made him shiver — a by-product of being so low on blood, he thought. After a feeding he could barely feel temperature at all. Suddenly his ears pricked at an unexpected sound.
"‘What the world…needs now,’" sang Jay.
"Wait, shh. Someone’s coming."
"I can’t hear—"
"Dammit," whispered Doug. "Hide."
Jay lurched in one direction, jerked back, lurched in another, tripped for no reason. He finally made it through a gauntlet of invisible obstacles and crouched behind a water fountain shaped like a hippopotamus throwing up.
Doug scrambled over the railing and found a ten-foot drop into the panda yard. He hung by locked and aching fingertips from the top of the wall as a night watchman ambled into view.
Nothing to see, Doug thought at the watchman. Just walk on by…