Chapter Text
“Welcome to A.Z. Fell and Co.!”
A heavenly bell rang sweetly as the young man stepped through the door of the musty bookshop. It had stood on this street corner for generations, and the man always meant to stop in when he passed it on his way to work every morning. The small sign on the door that read “under new management” in perfect handwritten script was the last push he needed to finally check it out. It seemed fascinatingly familiar, like a home he had lived in once but did not remember when. But then, most people got that feeling upon entering this particular bookshop.
The young man perused the shelves of the shop, taking in the smell of old paper and barely recognizing many of the volumes that he nonetheless found endlessly impressive and well-kept. Finally, he landed on an old childhood favorite: the exact edition of A.A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh that his father had handed down to him as a child, which he had promptly wagered and lost on the schoolyard during a game of Pogs. He fingered through the pages carefully, nostalgia washing over him with every simple illustration and clever bit of wordplay.
“May I help you with anything?”
The man jumped and turned to face the figure that was now standing behind him. They were petite and bright-eyed, appearing no older than him, much too young to own a bookshop, and yet dressed in clothes he could imagine his grandmother or even great-grandmother wearing. He supposed it was simply the trends now, vintage and second-hand clothing being all the rage with his friends’ younger siblings thanks to TikTok influencers and the like. Or perhaps they had inherited their pastel kilt and tattered waistcoat from the previous owner.
“Ah, yes,” stumbled the man, “How much for this one?”
The proprietor looked confused. “How much? How do you mean?”
How did he mean? The young man started to wonder if this person really did work at the shop, or if it was even a shop at all. “How much would I have to pay for this book? Like, to own it, how much do I owe you?”
“Oh, you don’t owe me anything,” beamed the bookseller. “It’s yours! Would you like a bag for it?”
He blinked. “Are you sure?”
“Very sure, as long as you take good care of it and use it to spread joy to others.” Their smile was kind and warm in a way that most smiles are not, which made the man a strange combination of at-ease and uneasy. “Bag for it, then?”
The young man couldn’t believe what he was hearing. What was the catch? Surely he wasn’t getting such a rare book for free. But the more he studied the bookseller’s face, the more he realized that they were one-hundred-per-cent genuine. “No, thanks,” he said, slipping the book into his satchel slowly, placing a five-pound note on the desk next to him, and finally walking out the door, all while glancing repeatedly at the proprietor to see if they would try to stop him.
What a stroke of luck! The young man glowed with happiness on his way to work, tracing the spine of the book in his bag as he went. He practiced in his mind the story he would tell to his coworkers about the strange bookshop he acquired it from, pictured the look of glee on his partner’s face when he showed it to her that night, and even allowed himself to imagine passing it down to his own child one day. Perhaps they would even trade it on the schoolyard in some mindless trend of a game like he had.
The binding brushed smoothly against his skin until, suddenly, it no longer did. The young man stopped in his tracks and stretched his hand in his bag, only being met with an empty space and the familiar feel of crumpled files. Furiously, he began pushing things aside, checking the bag with his own eyes over and over, examining for holes large enough for a book of that size to have fallen through. He surveyed the streets, unable to spot it being trampled somewhere behind him. How on Earth was that possible?
The door slammed against the foundation of the doorway, rattling the books inside, a few of which had just been welcoming the return of one of their comrades to its spot untouched on the shelf. “What have I told you about selling the books?” Crowley slinked across the foyer carrying an empty cardboard box. His eyebrows were solidly furrowed against the tops of his sunglasses, a look Muriel was quite used to at this point.
“Well, hello to you too, Mr. Crowley.” A hint of sass made its way into Muriel’s voice, followed by a poorly disguised giggle at the fact that they had managed to sass a demon. “I don’t see why I can’t just sell one book, seeing as it is my shop now. And it makes the humans so happy!”
Crowley grimaced at each point in Muriel’s statement. Ignoring them, he sauntered over to the shelf where the volume of Winnie-the-Pooh sat reconvening with its colleagues. He checked it for any damage before placing it, along with the surrounding books for good measure, in the box at his hip before moving onto another shelf. If he recalled correctly, the Austen books would be… Ah, yes, there they were. He dropped them into his box as well, still in disbelief that they existed. What a dark horse, that Jane Austen.
Muriel sputtered as they chased him around the shop, wincing at each stolen book but not quite gathering the courage to stop him. “Mr. Crowley, if I may, I would rather the humans have access to the books than you. After all, you are–”
“Don’t say it,” Crowley growled. “I’m not a… Not anymore. Your lot still call me an enemy, but I’m not. Just treat me like one of them, please.” There was an undeniable exhaustion in his voice. It had been a few years now, living as a human, or at least as human as an immortal occult being could believably pass as. He had a new flat that he paid for at least partially with his own money, which he was earning as a bartender at the Dirty Donkey. He’d stopped using miracles on minor inconveniences, and started talking to the Soho shopkeepers on occasion. It was almost relaxing, being human, if not a little lonely.
“Right, so no demonic wiles to thwart today, then.”
Crowley squinted at the angel through his dark glasses, almost mocking them. “No. No wiles.” The being spun lazily on his heel and slithered back toward the front door.
“Ah. Would you like to know what I’ve been planning, in case you wanted to try and–”
“Nope!” He called back. “And don’t try reaching me at my flat again, I don’t want to have to angel-proof it.”
Muriel chuckled nervously. “You can do that?”
“Yep. Never had to, but… you know. Methods exist.” Crowley switched the box to his other hip and opened the door. “You’re closed now, by the way.”
“Oh, but it’s only–”
“Yeah, shops ‘round here close early. You’re closed.”
Before Muriel could object again, the door shut behind the former demon with the sign now flipped to read ‘CLOSED’.