Yup, My Thoughts Exactly.

This diary is going on a short break 'til next week.

The person behind this blog is on a bookfair working very long hours and until I'm back, I'll let Crowley sleep in his beloved Bentley.

Let's all take a moment to savour the irony of a Crowley-coded person selling his books on a bookfair.

Not even at gunpoint and such. 👍😂

“Hello, Traitor.”

How?

How, how, how? How can she be in here?

I just got used to the fact that my Bentley has angelic protection now. And that protection didn't fade away when my angel left for Heaven. Demons can't be in here; they’d have to be invited in.

Shax obviously can. “I was going to pull you down to my new office, as it seems befitting for my new position. But you’re so miserable already, I didn’t want to drag you out of your safe space."

No, you just wanna throw it right into my face that you can be in said safe space without any consequences. Don't think I don't recognize your tactics.

"Besides, Hell doesn’t need to know about our little talk, do they?”

"Oh, are we having a talk?" Slouching in my seat I lean back, giving her my cheekiest smirk. Oh, I can feel her new powers emanating from her and I don't know what she's capable of, but there's no way in Hell, I'll show her any fear. Two can play this game.

"We are. I brought chocolates."

"Chocolates?" My face freezes again, this time with astonishment. "You honestly think, I can be won over with chocolates?"

She eyes me from the side. "Well, my first intent was using death threats, but after watching you cry and whine and sob all these last months, I didn't think you would mind discorporation or even destruction so much. If I threatened you, you'd probably respond with something like: 'I don't want to live without my angel!' or 'Please kill me already.' So, I decided not to do you that favour.”

All these last months watching Crowley TV? “Oh, so glad, I could contribute to your amusement with my misery.”

“You couldn’t. Although my associate quite enjoyed seeing you like this... Oh, that was sarcasm, wasn’t it? I’m getting very good at spotting it.”

“Oh, are you? My sincerest congratulations on making Duchess of Hell, then.”

“Thank you.” Shax looks very pleased with herself. “Finally, the next step in my career. Beelzebub was right about their departure offering chances. It won’t stop at this stage, though. I have great plans for my future.”

“Lemme guess.” I take a closer look at the box of chocolates lying on the dashboard. “Grand Duchess of Hell, Princess of Hell, Mother of Demons…”

She brought schnapspralinen. What am I gonna be, a kangaroo? Oh, but there’s whiskey and rum and vodka and ouzo and eau de vie and sake... oh, my! Pity, they aren’t full bottles, just tiny sips covered in chocolate.

“You’ve been out of Hell for a while.” Shax frowns, her giant face hovering over me. “But you do remember that demons don’t have… Crowley, what are you doing?”

“Right.” It’s all just a question of size, isn’t it? I’ll think, I’ll start with that round piece of cherry brandy. Ngk… why does that stupid pen have to be so heavy? And… bam! Nice little holey hole! Keep the good stuff flowing.

“Crowley! Will you stop this nonsense?”

She reaches for me, but I’m quicker, jumping down on the steering wheel to evade her hand. “What? A gift is a gift!”

“I want you to work for me, Crowley. You’ll get to be Duke of Hell, once I’m Grand Duchess. And you can have your flat back.”

“The Bentley’s fine. Lots and lots and lots of space for me to enjoy.” I slide down on one side of the steering wheel (hey, this is fun) and start to climb over the radio to get back on the dashboard.

This time, she’s quicker. Her hand comes down on me and she grabs me between her gloved fingers. “I could just squash you like a bug.”

“Right.” Tiny little tears spurt from my eyes. “My angel has left me for Heaven, please be merciful and end my suffering.”

“No. Stop being so pathetic.” She sets me down and I reach for the pen again. Your vodka’s mine, you pear-shaped piece of brittle chocolate. Hand it over right now!

There’s simply no way in Heaven or Hell I’m having the rest of this conversation sober.

~*~

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"Back in 1941 when we were in the bookshop, there was this song playing on the radio that Aziraphale liked so much. Something about angels dining at the Ritz and a nightingale.

He still refused to dance with me, though, because well, angels don't dance.

A few days later, though, when I drove by the bookshop, I saw him dancing in there all alone by himself. His eyes were closed and he had this dreamy far-off expression on his face that he sometimes gets when he reads one of his favourite books or smells some very delicious food. I've also seen this expression when he listens to his favourite composers, but never before with a modern song.

So, angels do dance, they just do it when no one's looking. I suppose, the cat's not dead as long as no one opens the box.

The very same song was playing on the radio again. Of course, I couldn't hear it through the windows of the bookshop, but I had the radio turned on in the car.

Some time after the war, when the song stopped being famous and wasn't played on the radio anymore, I sent Aziraphale a record of it. He never mentioned it, but he must have known it was from me because he said something about dining at the Ritz in a conversation we had a few years later.

Actually, the song isn't even about angels dining at the Ritz, that's just a figure of speech. It's about two lovers who spend one magical night with each other, but for some reason, they can't stay together and have to say goodbye in the morning.

I have the head canon that at some point, I like to think 1941, Crowley tried to slow dance with Aziraphale. He just got caught up in the moment and the music, extended their hand and said something like ‘may I have this dance’ or something like that. In response Aziraphale, even though he wanted to with every fibre of his celestial being, only sat up straight,cleared his throat and said ‘ Crowley, you know quite well that angels don’t dance’ and Crowley sat down again.

That’s why Crowley says‘you don’t dance’ at the ball.

"Nah, he's not monstrous, that's utterly ridiculous. He always puts other people's happiness before his own. He doesn't even permit himself to dance with me unless he plans a Jane Austen ball (she has balls) for other people's happiness first.

No, he never was abusive. He was supportive whenever he could and sometimes even, when it would have been the smarter thing to keep his mouth shut.

But, yes, he's a prick. Throwing away everything we could've had, just because he thinks, he can do goody-good in heaven.

They'll roast him alive.

Which they tried to do before."

Fandom acting like Aziraphale is the Bad Guy for asking Crowley to become an angel again is something else. I'm not arguing that offering to turn him into an angel again was the right thing to do, but CONTEXT MATTERS!!

Things Crowley has canonically said about his fall:

"I never asked to be a demon. I was just minding my own business one day and then… Oh, lookie here, it’s Lucifer and the guys. Oh, hey, the food hadn’t been that good lately. I didn’t have anything on for the rest of that afternoon. Next thing, I’m doing a million-light-year freestyle dive into a pool of boiling sulphur." (Aziraphale appeared to Crowley right after he said this so it's not outside of the realm of possibility that he found Crowley by following his voice in the first place.)

"I didn't mean to fall. I just hung around the wrong people."

"I didn't really fall. I just, you know, sauntered vaguely downwards." (Crowley says this to Aziraphale in the same scene he asks for holy water.)

Crowley was turned into a demon against his will.

Crowley hates being a demon too. It makes sense that Aziraphale would mistakenly believe that Crowley might accept the idea of becoming an angel again if what we were witnessing was Aziraphale being honest with Crowley in the final fifteen.

Again, I'm not saying he was right to ask that of Crowley, but let's not just decide that Aziraphale is a Bad Person for asking when he's witnessed ways in which Crowley has suffered as a demon.

There is indeed a lesson to be learned here, but why bring a little more context into the situation when it's just easier to villainize Aziraphale, am I right?

Yes, he was wrong to ask Crowley to become an angel again because it's not what Crowley wants. No, he's not a monster for offering. This is seriously all because of their stunning inability to communicate what it is they actually want.

Aziraphale has to break free from whatever hold Heaven still has on him, but he doesn't deserve to be treated like the Bad Guy.

It is entirely possible to criticize Aziraphale's actions without painting him as a monstrous abusive prick.

Trying to talk to Maggie and to Muriel – Attempt Nr.2

Hi Maggie, please tell Muriel to come over to the record shop, so that I need to say this only once: Stop trying to talk to me, the both of you. Stop sending me notes, stop trying to call me, just stop doing anything about me. I am not your friend and never will be.

There, you have it. Nice and short.

The only problem is, if I put it like that, Maggie will probably cry and Nina will give me her angry face again. And Muriel will look at me with those big brown eyes and think it’s their fault. And perhaps cry, too.

Enough! No more crying. I’m sick of blowing my nose all the time. It gets all red and blotchy. Why do noses always have to run when you cry! Major design flaw if you ask me. But I forgot, you are not asking, @the-almighty-god. You’re just playing your ineffable game. Next time, please play Dungeons & Dragons with us. At least that one has uhm…. dungeons and dragons and elves and Bags of Holding in it. I would quite like a Bag of Holding, then I could’ve kept all of my plants when Hell kicked me out of my flat.

Okay, next try: Hi Maggie and Muriel. I can’t be your friend because I don’t do friendships. Bye.

That one’s so short, I could actually write it on a card. Maybe I should, then I don’t have to talk to them. But Nina was very specific about this one. If you don’t want friends, you have to tell people to go away and you have to do it in person. Writing will not do, texting will not do, and simply going away until they forget about you will not do either. That one least of all.

Nina says, the truth is painful, but at least they’ll have a clean cut and they can start to heal. They can’t when I just leave them hanging. No closure.

Hi Maggie and Muriel. I don’t want to be your friend because I’m scared. Scared that I’ll get hurt when I open up to someone. Scared that you’ll get hurt, when Heaven and Hell start doing their thing again and we all get caught in the crossfire.

No, by ‘the truth’ I didn’t mean ‘that much truth’.

Just the clean cut. The one we never got to have. First, I walked out, then he walked away. We never sorted anything out. Did he leave because he chose Heaven over me? Did he leave because he chose Heaven for me? Did we break up? How can we break up if we aren’t even together? Are we still friends, or is everything over for good?

What does he want with Heaven? Does he truly believe, he can make a difference? Was it just an excuse to get away? Why did he kiss me back and then told me, he forgives me? Did he even listen to anything I said?

Why suddenly dance with me at the ball when he refused to dance with me back in 1941 when I asked him to? Why does he want me to be an angel again? Am I not okay for him the way I am? Does he even want to be “an us”, or did he at least want it before everything went down the drain? Does he still think about me as he is up there, doing God knows what?

Is he thinking of me right now? Perhaps this very moment?

I slam on the brakes and let the Bentley spin to the right, so the car behind me passes by without hitting me. The driver yells something rude, but I’m not listening to him. My mind is full of questions and I can’t answer a single one of them.  

No closure. No clean cut. Just pain.

I can’t heal because I’m left hanging. I can’t move on with my life because I don’t know what’s there to move on to and what there isn't. Is he still a part of this life or is he gone for good?

I’m on hold. I’m on hold like a human on a phone who doesn’t know if they should hang up or if they should wait for the conversation to continue. When Beelzebub came to talk to me about Gabriel, I understood immediately what was going on with them. Why can I not understand what is going on with us?

Again Nina’s words: “But then, other people’s love lives always seem so much more straightforward than our own.”

I start the Bentley’s engine again, but before I can bring my foot down, I freeze.

“Hello, traitor.”

 No literal freezing. Just a jumpscare.

“I was going to pull you down to my new office, as it seems befitting for my new position. But you’re so miserable already, I didn’t want to drag you out of your safe space. Besides, Hell doesn’t need to know about our little talk, do they?”

~*~

More Diary Parts

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@aziraphalesdiaries @muriel-not-the-dim-one

Good. So, there's at least one universe that has a happily-ever-after in store for us. Congrats to you, other me!

I will read your entries, while I drive around in my Bentley missing my angel who has gone up to Heaven and whom I probably will never see again.

Wait... reading and driving at the same time might not be the best of ideas...

I’d like to announce that after many, many years of courtship, I have participated in the very human (and quite romantic) act of marriage.

It was even better than Jane Austen presented.

Cat Booped Me Awake Today

Seems like I slept through another week. If it weren't for the cat, I would probably be sleeping still. Shouldn't leave the window open.

Things I Did Today:

Ate the rest of Shax' chocolates, simply because I'm booored. They were not poisoned.

Drove around for a bit.

Drove by the bookshop

Made another attempt at telling Muriel (or Maggie) I don't want be their friend. The attempt consisted of me sitting in the car in front of the bookshop

Drove away again

Drove by the University where they gave away old books today. They do that from time to time because they get lots of books from private collections, but they don't have room to store them all.

Took a few boxes of books and stored them in the bentley.

The plants were not pleased

Drove back to the bookshop

Placed the boxes by the door

Wrote a note to Muriel

~*~

More Diary Parts

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No, not really falling. More like... sauntering vaguely towards him.

But yes, ending up in another pool of burning lava. 🌋🐍😭

You know what I was just thinking about? That feeling when you fall hard for someone you can't have.

And every time you see them your heart jumps. You drop EVERYTHING for a chance to spend time with them. Hearing from them lights you up, and your life can be divided between the time you get to spend with them and the time spent waiting to be with them again.

That agonising, heartbreaking, soul-crushing feeling of having fallen so deep that you can't see a way out, and you don't even want to.

Now imagine that going on for hundreds of years.

And then, when it finally looks like there might be a way out, together, it gets ripped away.

I was just thinking about that.

Things To Do Today

Drive.

Just drive

Nothing else.

Waking up this morning, I knew instantly that today is a driving day. I've sobered up to get rid of the hangover, but my headache's still there and it's persistent. Should've sobered up yesterday night, but I kinda like the fuzzy head. Keeps me from thinking.

If there's enough pain in my head, I suppose, I won't worry too much about the pain in my heart.

I don't want to go anywhere near the bookshop. I don't, but I need to return the CD to Muriel before it looses its song. Still, I drive around all day to work up the courage.

The song starts five or six times while I'm driving back to Soho. I try to listen, but in the end I always turn it off. My car turns it back on. I turn it back off.

At the horizon, far beyond the end of the road, the sun's going down in a blaze of red and orange. Like the whole world was about to end in fire.

The street lanterns at Whickber Street flicker on as I pass through. The stores are closed at this hour, but there's still light in most of the restaurants and, of course, the pub.

I could go there, have a whiskey. Or I could have a bottle of wine at Marguerite's or a bottle of Tsingtao at Mr & Mrs Chen's place.

No, I can't. It would never be just one glass or one bottle. Wasting yourself on your own is fine, but not in front of people you used know. Not front of people he used to know.

If I was human, I'd probably be dead in a ditch somewhere three times over. Being who I am, I know how far I can take this. This may be the worst time, but it is certainly not the first.

It's not even the first time I got my heart ripped out, but last time happened to be a bit more literal.

Do mine eyes deceive me? There's light in the bookshop. No, not in the shop itself, but up in the flat, in the very guest room that Gabriel used to live in when he was Jim.

For a brief moment I allow myself to imagine what it would be like if Aziraphale was still in there. He'd notice I was on my way and open the door for me. And then we'd sit inside and talk about something or other, have a drink or two, and maybe talk some more. He would have a snack and I would watch him eat. He would get excited about something and bounce around and I would listen to the ridiclous sounds coming out of his mouth.

And watch his smile. That beautiful beautiful smile. And everything would just be fine for a few hours.

A familiar silhouette at the window. Muriel is sitting there, probably on the inside sill, their head bent over a book they're holding. They're a fast reader, turning the pages at a quick and steady pace.

I wonder why Muriel didn't take Aziraphale's room. It's bigger than the guest room and it's not like he'll be back anytime soon.

Angels and their faith...

I drop the CD in the letterbox inside the door, trying to avoid any noises. Back on the road, I look up to the window again.

Muriel still seems busy with their book. I hope, they read all the brilliant ones first, then the good ones before moving on to the trash that they inevitably will find.

But then, these humans never can tell the difference. Goethe's Faust was a good book. Marie Corelli's Sorrows of Satan was a brilliant one.

I cross the road and signal for my car to come pick me up. Nina is still inside her closed-for-the-night-coffee shop sitting at a table across Maggie. They're talking to each other and they both look worried.

Time to get out of here. Just as the Bentley speeds around the corner, Maggie spots me and starts waving frantically. Nina looks up, too, her expression a mix and match between a sigh of relief and a death glare.

No. No talk. I don't want to talk to any of you. I did what I came for and now I'm leaving.

Just leave me alone, all of you!

~ * ~

More Diary Parts:

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And my absolute highlight at Proud Nerd Con was, of course, meeting David Tennant.

I can tell you, he really is a wonderful person. Often when you meet actors in real life, it's a little bit of a disappointment, and the things we love about them, are just show. That's not the case with him.

He cares for his fans, and he means it. It was an incredible busy day for him, autograph sessions, photoshots, meet and greets, and pannels, he really was rushing from one thing to the next all day. But he went out of his way caring for his fans, even when he was getting tired at the end of the day.

He answered as many questions as possible, he had smiles and kind words for everyone, and even some hugs (with asking consent first, of course.). It really felt like he had adopted all of us.

He loved being at the convention. He called it "absolutely bananas" and said he enjoyed the cheerful atmosphere. Everybody got to be themselves, and no one needed to hide anything.

He is also incredibly funny. And it's not that kind of funny that mocks other people that you see so often in bad comedians. He loves to tell stories, he loves to play with with language, and he really had us laughing our heads off. His jokes are silly (the good kind), and his humour is incredibly intelligent.

His charms and great personality carried a big part of the event and turned it from a wonderful day into a truly magical day. Everyone was still glowing on the bus ride back to the train station.