Sincerely, I thought I was. After the crazy rat hunt that ended with me showing the rat the way out to the back garden, I thought I was done with the rat for good. Finally, there was peace and quiet, no scurrying of tiny feet, no random rat droppings found all around.
A few days later, I heard him whilst I was sleeping. He was trying to get into my dustbin by my desk. I turned and switched on the light to see him on the ground, staring at me. I stared back. We had a moment, a single silent moment.
In a tiny squeak, the rat said "fuck me dead!" and ran off under the piano.
I spoke to the rat once again. I reasoned with him. I asked him nicely.
"Please, stop bugging me. I just want to go to sleep. If you quit bugging me I won't bug you. You do your thing, I'll do mine and everything will be alright."
The rat was silent. I think it got the message and I finally got to sleep.
Thinking all was fine once again I carried on with my business as the days progressed. Then one evening the Voxel peeps popped over. I was to help them do some voice overs for an animatic. I was in the midst of setting up my mic when I turned and saw him. There he fucking was again!
"Shhh," I told everyone, "be vewy, vewy quiet..."
The rat saw me and ran into my shoe cabinet. I gave chase, looked inside and saw to my dismay that there was a hole in the wall and it scurried in.
Bastard. That's how you got in, eh?
I closed up the shoe cabinet and carried on with the evening's plans. Finally, everything seemed to be alright.
Until last Saturday.
I had smelled it before, but it had gotten stronger. The scent. The odour. Essence of Rat. And on Saturday it was stronger than it had ever been. Either the rat had died or it was pissed off at me for locking him up in the shoe cabinet and then proceeded to piss everywhere. It could be anything. Regardless, I couldn't sleep at the Hub that night. The stench was overbearing. Spring cleaning was in order.
As Sunday rolled around I headed straight to the Hub and promptly took out all the cleaning products and began moving cabinets and drawers to check the small slits between them and the walls to see if the Rat had committed suicide behind them. Nothing. Dammit.
I then checked the shoe cabinet. Many of my friends had suggested ways of blocking up the hole, ranging from putty to tin foil to mirrors in an attempt to confuse him. I checked the shoe cabinet, started wiping about the area to get rid of any rat pee or poo...
...and discovered there was no hole at all.
What looked like a hole in the wall was actually an old rolled up poster that, at the angle I last saw it, looked like it was part of the wall. The rat must have hidden inside the poster when I gave chase and had somehow escaped. Bastard. I cleared up the shoe cabinet, sprayed and cleansed it and chucked the poster in my dustbin.
As I was clearing up the other areas I started sweeping around the piano when my instincts told me to sniff the area. I did, and the scent was much stronger. Shit, now I have to move the frickin' piano. After much pushing and pulling I managed to do so and there the basterd was, dead as Dillinger.
I find it odd that of all the areas behind the piano it could die, it chose the spot next to the handiplast adhesive strips.
About 10cm away from the rat were remnants of the ancient rat poison that was scattered here and there in nooks and crannies, and the most probable cause of death. I grabbed the dead rat with a plastic bag and disposed of it properly before giving the entire area a good mopping.
However, the scent was still somewhere in the house, even after disposing of the rat corpse. I carried on cleaning up and followed my nose, all the way to my dustbin. Perhaps it was the poster, perhaps it had pissed all over it and rubbed its armpits on the corners. I brought the dustbin outside, tipped the contents as there was much dust that I wanted to sweep up and put in a proper bag for disposal...
...and out popped another frickin' basterd rat!
So there were two rats. Two of them scurrying about, either independent of each other or working as a team, both confusing the fuck out of me.
I disposed of the second corpse and carried on cleaning up, getting rid of any remnants of eau de Rat. Finally, the Hub was comfortable. Finally, the Hub felt right. Finally, the Hub smelt like how it was supposed to smell...
...of man sweat, cigarettes and remnants of burnt toast. Ahh...
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