Work Text:
1994
At this point, Aziraphale had housed many people in the small flat above his bookshop since its opening in 1800, he scarcely needed it. Recently, the “adoptees” (Crowley’s words, not Aziraphale’s) had for the most part stopped, he had visitors from time to time that really only needed a good pep talk and strong tea, maybe a call to a demon to ask a favor to drive them to a relative, or payment for a train there.
The little knock the shop’s door indicated a visitor, hopefully not one desiring to use the shop for its intended use of selling books. Aziraphale marked his Oscar Wilde with a novelty bookmark from a museum he had gone to with Crowley in Amsterdam. “Just a moment,” the angel called, adjusting his coat, “Oh dear.”
He opened the door and let the visitor in, a girl, maybe seventeen, she brushed snow out of her green hair and picked up a book Aziraphale hadn’t remembered stocking, with gloved hands. Sometimes teenagers had a habit of picking up books Aziraphale hadn’t seen before, those were some of the only books he sold. The girl turned and clutched the book to her chest, Annie on my Mind .
The hopefully-not-customer smiled meekly at Aziraphale with a pierced lip, “Are you A.Z?”
“Yes, I am,” Aziraphale was normally called Mr.Fell by potential customers, the use of A.Z was promising. The girl smiled and unzipped her winter coat, underneath which was a denim jacket, though beneath all the patches you could hardly see the denim. Aziraphale walked to her and grabbed the coat, “Let me take that, my dear girl.”
“Micah told me you were sweet,” the punk smiled again, upon closer inspection, a scab was developing around her lip ring. Aziraphale remembered Micah, sweet boy, really, though with the amount of holes in his jeans Aziraphale was surprised the young man didn’t freeze to death. This girl was a bit more sensible, at least she had tights beneath her plaid skirt.
“You must be Annabelle,” Micah had told Aziraphale about his friend Annabelle who was having troubles at home over a cup of tea he’d put far too much sugar in.
“Oh God, only my father calls me that anymore, it’s just Annie,” Annie extended a hand, Aziraphale noted the poor state of her manicure, the black nail polish was just hanging on by its last legs.
“Pleasure to meet you, Annie.”
Annie, despite appearances, was very soft-spoken, even if she did swear like a sailor. She put a sensible amount of sugar into her tea, though she stirred it with shaking hands that had been un-gloved to reveal bloody knuckles.
“When you’re done we are taking a look at those injuries, young lady,” Aziraphale chided, he knew the drill at this point, he finished off his tea (as he did not have to wait for it to cool before drinking) and went in search of the first-aid kit in his backroom. In theory, he could simply miracle away any injuries, but he had learned from experience it was better to take care of them the human way in these cases.
Annie pushed her teacup away, indicating that she was finished, and presented her hands to the angel, he bunched up her sleeves a bit. “How’d you end up here, dear?”
“Well, it was a long ti-” Annie hissed as he rubbed at her scabs with alcohol, “It was a long time coming. ‘Nd it was my fucking fault.”
Aziraphale slapped her hand not unkindly, “Oh hush. It was most certainly not your fault.”
“Sure feels like it,” Annie frowned, “I pierced my lip yesterday and I think it pushed my father over the edge.” The angel frowned now. “I didn’t do it myself! My girlfriend did it for me and we had all the shit you need, had a safety pin and everything.”
“You’re going to get an infection, go to the bathroom and take it out, up the stairs, first door on your left,” Annie begrudgingly walked to the bathroom, chunky platforms clonking as she went. The bell above the shop’s door announced another visitor, Aziraphale could have sworn he locked it. “We’re closed!” Aziraphale yelled.
“You should learn to keep your door locked, ‘s not safe.”
Aziraphale lit up, though he wouldn’t call it that, he just hadn’t heard that voice in a few years, was all. “ Crowley, ” Aziraphale turned, Crowley’s clothes weren’t unlike the girl struggling with her lip ring upstairs. Except for the fact that Annie’s clothes were, for the most part, second hand, Crowley didn’t do second hand, nearly everything he had in his possession had had one owner from new, clothes included.
The demon smiled like a snake and pushed up his sunglasses, “Hey, angel.” Said angel sighed and looked Crowley up and down, careful to not linger too long on the down bit, though.
“Now isn’t the time, my dear,” Aziraphale fiddled at the ring on his pinky finger and Annie clunked her way down the stairs.
“Another adoptee?” Crowley asked.
“They are not adoptees, Crowley,” Aziraphale had been telling him this for nearly two centuries, the adolescents he took in were just people in need of help, he’d been helping since even before the shop opened, it’s what angels do. Sometimes, they would guess that he was not, in fact, a man who looked exactly like his father, and his father’s father and so on. Those occasions were rare, but anybody involved in the situation remembered it fondly, though they would never tell anyone else. In the back of Aziraphale’s mind, there was the sneaking suspicion that his secret had been shared, but if it had it was only shared with people in their little circles, and those people wouldn’t tell anybody else.
Annie cleared her throat, “A.Z,” she dragged out her words (letters?), “You didn’t tell me your husband would be over. Can’t live together, huh? That’s a bitch, me ‘nd my girlfriend were just planning on running off to the Netherlands or somethin’ y’know?”
Crowley’s eyebrows shot into his hairline, Aziraphale did the same. “He’s not- we’re not married,” Aziraphale stammered.
“Of course you’re not, ‘s not legal,” Annie grinned, “I just meant you’re like life partners.”
“I’d say that,” Crowley winced when Aziraphale punched him lightly on the arm. Well, Aziraphale thought it was light, the angel was a lot stronger than he looked (or knew).
“Does anybody actually use your bed, A.Z? It looks like it hasn’t been used in fuckin’ years,” commented Annie.
“Nah, he sleeps at my place,” Crowley put a hand on Aziraphale’s shoulder, the angel jumped at the unexpected contact. Annie nodded with a knowing smile, reminding Aziraphale she had a cut lip that needed attention.
“Crowley, dear, please take these dishes to the kitchenette,” Aziraphale gestured to the two teacups and their spoons, Crowley sighed and obliged the angel as Annie sat on the floor, tilting her face up. Aziraphale tutted and pulled out another alcohol wipe, the girl winced as he cleaned up the blood, one hand on her bony shoulder so she couldn’t wriggle free.
“Fuck,” she said through gritted teeth, Aziraphale wiped the rest of the blood away, it was fresh now, “A.Z it’s fine.”
“It is not, young lady,” he assured her, this was not a safety pin piercing, he’d dealt with plenty of those the last few decades. It might have started that way but the hole dragged down, upon closer inspection her gums were cut and bleeding, too. The angel put a steri-strip over the now clean split lip, “What did you do to yourself, dear?”
“Pops got hella mad when he saw the ring,” she said through the cotton ball Aziraphale had given her to put on her bleeding gums, “He thought it was fake, tried to tear it off.”
“I don’t like your father,” said Aziraphale, “You aren’t going back there.”
“Me fuckin’ too,” Annie huffed, Crowley popped his head into the room and brushed his hands on his leather pants, as if that would help them dry, Aziraphale smiled that he’d actually cleaned the dishes rather than miracle them.
“Language, dear,” the angel chided, though he hardly meant it, something was endearing about scrappy kids swearing like sailors.
Crowley hummed and nodded in agreement, “Yeah kid, watch your fucking language.”
“Crowley!”
The demon threw his hands in the air defensively, “Sorry, angel.”
“Go order us some food or something,” Aziraphale wrapped a hand around Annie’s tiny arm, “Do you like sushi, dear?” Annie nodded, and Aziraphale reached in his pocket for a twenty pound note, handing it to Crowley, who already knew what Aziraphale would like.
“Since when do you eat takeout?” Crowley whispered, Aziraphale didn’t answer and shoved the demon out the door. Aziraphale would have preferred to not eat takeout, but the closest place had been referred to him, and he didn’t want to leave the shop, it was also good to get Crowley out, lest he have two fiends under the bookshop’s roof.
“My sister left some of her clothes here and I think they would be just your size, dear,” Aziraphale fibbed, he was awful at lying, but a tiny fib was easy as pie (though pie was actually quite difficult to make, he had tried in 1952 and it hadn’t gone well), “She wouldn’t mind you taking them.”
“You sure?”
“Yes, I am, rather.”
When Annie had changed into the black pajamas Aziraphale had summoned for her, she started to dig through his records, most of which were from Crowley. She muttered the bands under her breath as she went “Queen, The Beach Boys, Queen, Frank Sinatra, Crew Cuts, The Sound of Music? Really?”
“It was a gift from a friend,” friend was a loose word, Gabriel had thought it an excellent material object to give to Aziraphale to ‘remind him of Home’, home was another word used very loosely.
“A-ha!” Annie pulled an album Aziraphale was unaware he owned out of the box, “I’m just assuming this is Crowley’s, you don’t seem the Green Day type.” Aziraphale, fully aware of what a ‘green day’ was, shook his head. Annie took the record currently on the phonograph (Beethovens’s Greatest Hits) and slipped it in its sleeve, replacing it with the Green Day she’d found, “God, I love this song, I can play it on bass.”
“You play the guitar?” Aziraphale turned the music down.
“Hell yeah!” Annie laughed and played air guitar, singing along to the obscene song. The bell above the shop announced the arrival of a demon with sushi, he had somehow known exactly what everyone in the bookshop wanted.
Annie wolfed down her food, holding her chopsticks wrong and dipping the rolls in far too much soy sauce, complaining about the sting of it in her cuts. With a gesture of Aziraphale’s properly held chopsticks, the sting disappeared, only allowing the girl to eat faster. Aziraphale ate his food slowly, as usual, savoring every (surprisingly good) bite. Crowley, on the other hand, didn’t eat anything of his own, as usual, the demon had recently started eating only in stolen bites from Aziraphale’s plate. Angels and demons couldn’t really get full, but Aziraphale often would and the rest was pushed over to Crowley, who, for the most part, enjoyed everything that Aziraphale did.
Eventually, Annie had to turn in, something Aziraphale occasionally forgot humans needed to do, to him, sleeping was something to pass the time or divide days. Had there not been people in need of shelter during the forties, Aziraphale would have tried to sleep through the war.
“‘Night, A.Z,” Annie yawned, “You and Crowley can go to his place I won’t burn the shop down.”
Crowley for the second time that night, wrapped an arm around Aziraphale’s shoulders, “We’ll stay here tonight, ‘ve already watered my plants.”
“Please don’t keep her up with botany, dear boy. Goodnight, dear,” Aziraphale waved to the girl, an excuse to get Crowley’s not unwanted arm off of his shoulder.
Annie’s girlfriend was over to pick her up a week later, miraculously, a small flat near a corner store with two job openings in Amsterdam had just opened, and the rent had just lowered to something affordable for two corner store workers. Aziraphale and Crowley were both there to say goodbye, and as Crowley patted the hood of the car, its tank filled with petrol and its moderately shotty engine had been restored.
Annie leaned over in the passenger’s seat to kiss her girlfriend, and Crowley made a gesture to the car’s bumper, Aziraphale rolled his eyes, and with a wave of his manicured hand, the Just Married cans on strings disappeared.