(no subject)
A bookshop is rather like a library, and really ought to be quiet - occasionally a little gentle classical music is permitted, if the angel's feeling chipper, but for the most part silence reigns, bar the occasional papery rustlings that mark the presence of interlopers. Or, as they are sometimes known, 'browsers'.
(Aziraphael rarely has 'customers'. Placing a worth on books, in his opinion, cheapens them; accepting money for them is as bad as prostitution of the writer's mind.)
The loud and hissing voices from the kitchen are entirely out of place, disrupting the calm with news of a UN mission chief found dead, calls for Iraqi unity, the burning of a historic church.
He's almost entirely out of teabags.
Aziraphael doesn't know that the 24 hour news channels can't be received by the ancient aerial perched, somewhat precariously, on top of the cupboard - as a result, neither does his television. He hasn't moved, overmuch, except to open the kitchen window, heart in his throat, to admit Huma.
A hasty scrawl - not much, but more than he'd expected.
Crowley - he'd written, in return.
So I've seen. Please take care of yourself.
I worry.
- Aziraphael.
There are a thousand more things that need to be said, but not on paper.
It's not as though Lucifer's argument doesn't prey on his mind - it had been carefully judged in order that it would - but perhaps not entirely as intended. The knowledge that this (this? Whatever he and Crowley still have, but he won't think about that just yet) was never meant to be is nothing new. He's aware that his kind - he's aware that such a thing has never succeeded before.
What hurt is the implication that he doesn't care, that Crowley's feelings don't matter to him.
What is unbearable is how easy it is to see how that conclusion could be reached.
And how impossible it apparently is to work out how to fix it.
(Aziraphael rarely has 'customers'. Placing a worth on books, in his opinion, cheapens them; accepting money for them is as bad as prostitution of the writer's mind.)
The loud and hissing voices from the kitchen are entirely out of place, disrupting the calm with news of a UN mission chief found dead, calls for Iraqi unity, the burning of a historic church.
He's almost entirely out of teabags.
Aziraphael doesn't know that the 24 hour news channels can't be received by the ancient aerial perched, somewhat precariously, on top of the cupboard - as a result, neither does his television. He hasn't moved, overmuch, except to open the kitchen window, heart in his throat, to admit Huma.
A hasty scrawl - not much, but more than he'd expected.
Crowley - he'd written, in return.
So I've seen. Please take care of yourself.
I worry.
- Aziraphael.
There are a thousand more things that need to be said, but not on paper.
It's not as though Lucifer's argument doesn't prey on his mind - it had been carefully judged in order that it would - but perhaps not entirely as intended. The knowledge that this (this? Whatever he and Crowley still have, but he won't think about that just yet) was never meant to be is nothing new. He's aware that his kind - he's aware that such a thing has never succeeded before.
What hurt is the implication that he doesn't care, that Crowley's feelings don't matter to him.
What is unbearable is how easy it is to see how that conclusion could be reached.
And how impossible it apparently is to work out how to fix it.