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Aziraphale leaves, he leaves and Crowley, Crowley does, he doesn’t do anything. He drives for a while, drives to nowhere, unseeing, unthinking, drives for days, weeks, drives until he ends up back where he started, where Aziraphale left, where he got into the lift and he left and Crowley, Crowley sits in his car for a long time, until the anger that wasn’t really for Aziraphale, it was and it wasn’t, his ribcage is too small. It recedes, the anger, it doesn’t leave, it will never leave, it’s been six thousand years and he’s still -he doesn’t want to think, he doesn’t want to think and he doesn’t want to be here and he needs- he sits until he can’t stand sitting still for a second longer so-
So he gets out of the car, he leaves his plants, they’re dead now anyways, and he goes into the bookshop. He doesn’t say anything to it’s new minder, she might say something to him but he doesn’t care, doesn’t listen, doesn’t hear anything but the bell that jingled when he opened the door, the sound playing in his ears over and over and over. He goes upstairs to the flat, his flat, he goes to Aziraphale’s bedroom, he’s seen it before, it’s untouched, the bed made, a bit dusty form disuse, his fingers brush against the duvet and he wants, he wants, he- Crowley’s never touched the bed before.
The bedroom, his bedroom, it’s not right, he doesn’t want to think and he’s thinking and so he leaves, slams the door, cracks open the silence like a butchers knife brought down through bone, regrets it, didn’t mean it, he wants to leave, he should leave but he needs - The couch, Aziraphale liked the couch, his little kitchenette, his mugs and his tea pot and he’s not here so what does it matter?
It matters, it matters so much, it’s everything, it’s the only reason he can breathe in this too tight cage. So, so Crowley finds a blanket, he toes off his shoes, drops his glasses on the coffee table, curls up on the couch, draws the blanket up to his shoulders but it’s not enough because he- he left for the one place Crowley couldn’t follow, he left for- he draws the blanket over his head, until it’s all dark, until he’s wrapped up tight. He wraps himself up in this place that is his, that smells like him and feels like him and it hurts, by God it hurts so much but not more than it would hurt to be anywhere else, to leave.
Did it hurt Aziraphale to-
Crowley closes his eyes and he doesn’t want to think, he can’t think, he can hardly breathe, so he closes his eyes and forces his lungs to move in the tightly constricted cage. He closes his eyes, clutches the blanket so it’s taunt against his back, his knees under his chin and he left for them and Crowley wonders why he ever thought he’d do anything else.
He closes his eyes and he sleeps, sleeps with no intention to wake up again. What would be the point?