“Their food is already elemental, so I’m constructing. I’m using a zebra-blood jelly that’s been sweetened with honey and spiced with cinnamon, a tree bark. The meat and fat component are suet mincemeat with black pudding. All layered with organic Devon cream, of course.”

“Mmm, sounds … unique.”

It was unique. Uniquely bad. I took one small bite of the sweet, greasy, mealy, salty trifle and looked for a place to spit it out. Another guest was ahead of me and pretending to cough as she turned toward a palm in a glazed red pot.

“Hmm,” Wil said after a taste.

“A noble experiment,” Graham, our host, said as he gathered up dishes of dreadful dessert and passed around packets of chocolate-covered biscuits.

Wil and I left the table and went to sit on a long leather sectional. He pulled me close to lean against him and played with my hand, sending a continual stream of pleasant zings through me in the way that alcohol and drugs could not.

“Wilcox, I’ve been meaning to ask you, how does a vampire surf?”

He laughed. “Bleak, isn’t it, being an English vampire surfer? It’s like being a Jamaican bobsledder. I wait for bad weather and there’s night surfing. Haul some floodlights on a lorry, position them on a cliff, and let the good times roll.”

“If you came out of the coffin, it would be easier to do what you love. Most people have no idea of how everyday life is restricted and limited by others’ fears and prejudices.”

“Yeah, and there’s also sun poisoning.” He obviously needed to be cheered from his weighty, unhappy thoughts because he asked, “Do you want to go dancing after this?”

“I’d love to.”

Graham put out bottles of icy vodka and a tray with slices of lemon, lime, a mound of sea salt, and sprigs of fresh dill and fennel. “Have you decided who’s first?”

“Me, I am,” said one of the grad students. “I’ve only had herb salads for a month. I’ll taste brilliant.”

She stood up and took off her sweater, revealing a thin wifebeater and lots of skin.

A brawnier guy scoffed, “You’re a trinket. There’s nothing in you to drink.”

“Shut up, you,” she answered cheerfully. “You fainted the last time you saw a needle.”

More guests advocated for themselves and after lots of competitive insults, three of them were selected. The zoologist/amateur chef brought out a black leather doctor’s bag, and Graham placed a silver tray with thimble-small glasses on a tall cabinet.

They offered me the first taste. When I hesitated, Wil said teasingly, “Come on, Eve, you’ve already had the apple.”