Abraham was awakened by the banging of the broom in the hallway outside his door. The scuffling of shoes and the half stifled yelps and complaints of the woman who had been sweeping the narrow corridor of the inn's second floor, further awakened the man who sat up lethargically, slowly reclaiming his normal awareness of things about him. And he looked to the wall when the woman exclaimed something under her breath, and the broom began to jab at the floorboards, and then swept roughly along the wall. He knew this from the sounds of bristles and of wood scraping against wood, "Git, git you little beast! Hang the man who let you in! Git-! Oh no, no no you won't crawl back there, little beastie. I'll drown you in my mop bucket, I will! Don't you tempt me!"
The man seated in bed yawned extensively and then stretched his arms. Feeling good, Abraham smiled as he looked over his curtained window, and saw daylight. No, it wasn't daylight. It was twilight, though the sun was still strong. Abraham threw open the curtains to be sure, and he pulled up the window mere inches before slamming it shut once more, the cold having nipped his fingers. But in the process, he crushed one of those unfortunate fingers. Cross with this unpleasant development, Abraham stepped aside and about aimlessly, wringing his hand and cringing until he resorted to sucking on the finger, now frowning with a furrowed brow and a much less than cheerful mood. Popping the finger free from his mouth, Abraham grumbled, seemingly to himself, "We'll leave now. It's too late for supper, of course. But we'll both go hungry tonight."
Abraham was standing beside his bed, but he stepped towards the pair of not so clean boots which were stationed at the foot of this piece of sleepy furniture. Thinking he was going to yawn again, the man wasted a few seconds doing nothing before he gave up on the yawn; Abraham returned the throbbing finger to his mouth tiredly, his expression dull though the sleep had been removed by his pain. His mouth bent in an angular frown, and his brow folded as he suddenly dropped to a crouch, looking hard at one boot in particular. He leaned at a slant to check his left boot briefly, then frowned at the right boot. Twitching his nose, Abraham sniffed. He removed his finger and wiped it on the trousers he had slept in, not quite comfortably, and then he clicked his tongue as he set to work a bit sluggishly.
Pulling at the tongue of the boot, Abraham searched the interior, looking rather befuddled as he sighed and sat on the floor, bending forward to pull the boot into his lap. He tugged at the sides and the tongue, and then stuffed his hand deep inside, wincing as he tried to wiggle his fingers towards the toe. Finally reaching it, his moment of accomplishment flared in his suddenly blazing blue eyes, and Abraham grinned automatically, victoriously, before all sense of self-worth deflated as he poked and prodded at the soft mass of his sock, and he pulled it out to frown at the disappointing garment. He unraveled and flattened the sock before draping it over his leg.
With the boot in his lap and the sock on his leg, Abraham looked from one to the other, unhappy with both. And he glanced up towards his door, where, farther down the hallway, the woman hissed and growled over the sloshing slaps of water in her mop bucket.
Abandoning his boot and sock, letting them fall to the floor, Abraham entered the hallway barefoot, in just his shirt and wrinkled trousers. His long stride connected with the chill floor, making him wince as the cold steadily sunk into his toes. But he spoke to the woman who would not have otherwise noticed him, struggling as she was with her mop bucket, her hand tucked into a large brush which she was using to battle with the fretful water.
"Ah, ah, excuse me." He was looking at the water, his brow pinched with embarrassed concern. The woman stared at him, lips parted and mute as she saw his attire. She noted in amazement, the three undone buttons which descended, quite immodestly, towards a well-shaped chest. And the immodest, not-fully-dressed man bent over her bucket and grimaced at the thrashing which continued under the murky surface of swirling dirty contents. Casting hasty glances at the bewildered woman's face, Abraham murmured sincere apologies, "I believe, I believe this is mine."
With a moment's hesitation, his hand lowering over the bucket and then drawing back slightly when he saw that the woman's brush was in the way, Abraham pursed his lips and decided against the awkwardness of asking the woman to move, and so shoved his arm into the sloppy water, down under the brush, where he hit the bottom of the bucket. Just as he could feel the drowning thing grasping at his wrist and fingers, Abraham drew in a sharp breath and shut his eyes tightly, regretting the cold and uncleanly water that now soaked his sleeve. Oh well.
Roughly fishing around in the bucket for a mortifying period that felt five times longer than it had been, with the woman's gape above him, Abraham finally pulled out the streaming mass once the woman had removed the brush as she stumbled back, becoming abruptly aware of her hindrance. Abraham could see that his behavior had shocked her, though he hoped she would not be further upset by the unfortunate fact that his arm and captured vermin were currently streaming filthy water onto her partially swept floor.
His head and neck hot, and perspiration beading on his back, Abraham smiled at the woman whose job he had made infinitely more difficult. And he laughed hollowly as he met her stare with an unnatural, and extremely uncomfortable, stiffness. "Yes, well then. Good morning- evening. I'll be packing to leave. You don't need to go through the trouble of telling me when the cab has arrived… I'll wait outside for it."
And he strode back to his room, hearing the water fall in his wake, with his cold feet now uncomfortably damp as well, he did not breathe normally until he had shut the bedroom door and his back landed against it, forcing out the relief he had finally attained. Swallowing and scanning the empty room, finding the boot lying on its side and the sock beside it, Abraham simply breathed and listened to the water that continued to drip onto the floor. A puddle formed against his bare foot, and his first thought was that he had nothing with which to clean it.
When the wet thing in his hand started swinging as it squirmed, Abraham finally looked down at the vermin and lifted it higher so he could inspect the filthy state of the creature. But the small thing suddenly spread out its wings and flapped furiously, making Abraham hit his head against the door as he tried to dodge the flinging water and debris. His eyes shut tight, Abraham held the bat away from himself, but once Alucard had finished attempting to dry bits of his fur and had folded the wings away, the displeased master yanked the damp furry thing towards his glaring eyes and bitter scowl.
"I never gave you permission to leave, you wretched, wretched-" he shook the bat as it swung with its feet clenched in Abraham's fist, "-stupid vampire. Foolish, stupid vampire!" He growled as he marched to his bed and to the fallen boot. Abraham sat on the cold floorboards, huffing in anger, glaring again at the bat he brought to eye-level, and then dropped his fist to the floor, where Alucard crumbled like a dirty rag under his knuckles. His free hand tugging the boot into his lap, Abraham muttered in German, shoving his arm into the boot with difficulty (being one handed) and then scowling angrily at himself when he realized he'd already removed the sock. But as he snatched up the sock he'd sat on, Abraham suddenly threw both of his hands into the hard wood floor as he looked directly up at the ceiling with a vexed groan. The sock faired better than the wet bat, as the sock was released and left alone, while Alucard was ripped back into the air and sung about violently. The black raggedy body stilled in front of the aggravated features of his master Van Hellsing. "You're wet! All wet! Where will I keep you now, huh? Where?"
Abraham scowled and suddenly grabbed his boot and tossed it to the side. It banged into the floor loudly. "What? I can't put you back in there, you'd get it wet." He flung the sock after the boot. "And this, you'd get it wet." He sighed and shifted about so he could cross his legs and rest his cheek against his fist as he thought. Staring at his bed, the comforter and its worn dye, he let his bat-filled hand hang off of his other knee, which shoved Alucard's snout directly into the man's damp, cold, and dirty toes.
There was squirming before an upset flurry of wings got the unmindful master to pull the vampire up once more, and Abraham snorted and smirked as he could almost see Dracula's rage in the beastly features that glowered at him. Alucard wrapped his wings about himself and tucked his snout against his chest, so as to sharpen his glare. Which only caused Abraham to snort a second time, amused as he now purposely bobbed the bat's head into and away from his foot. With each lowering and raising of the creature, the wings became more unraveled, then more spread, then they flapped as the furry body rotated back and forth while it dangled from Abraham's clenched hand. Teeth were barred as the sharp bat fangs hissed.
Abraham grew bored, and he looked about himself to decide where to put the soggy creature, finally resorting to the cold floor itself, having no better place. He leaned back with his hands behind him, sighing once more, as in the window his 'morning' darkened into night. Idly, Abraham watched Alucard flail like an overturned hamster and then flip himself onto his stomach, composing himself with agitated movements. Then the bat sat there, compressing itself into the minimal amount of space it could occupy. This posture said, I don't want to be here, so I'm going to make it look like I'm not here (or at least try to).
"I don't want you in my coat," Abraham watched the black ears twitch and then rotate, alert and searching, "You're wet, and you're filthy." Abraham lifted his soiled, clinging sleeve, which was freezing and he had no clean spare. But something smelly would be an improvement to wet, cold, and gritty. "And look at this, look at what I've got to deal with now. I should've let you drown in the mop bucket, you stupid, stupid vampire."
But they sat in quiet, doing nothing, Abraham not packing his things as he'd said he would; he hadn't unpacked anything when they'd arrived earlier that morning, closer to noon. All he needed to do was dress himself, then all his possessions would be collected. And this little bugger here, Abraham smirked at the compressed bat, with his wet spiked and disheveled fur, this little fool. Abraham let out a hearty laugh, warming as he let himself enjoy the memory now that the awful moment had passed. Alucard started and the scrunched wings moved restlessly before the bat compressed himself again, his head low and his ears revolving constantly.
"If you could have died in that bucket!" Abraham made himself laugh, and he almost rubbed his face with his wet sleeve, but he caught himself and switched to the other. Chuckling, the man pushed himself up from the floor and went over to his luggage, where he unsnapped a few buckles and drew out the shirt he had worn two days ago, for a period of three days. He was in desperate need of a return visit home, if only to look respectable and not offend his patrons with his appearance and odor.