Now she actually WANTS me to be mean to Maggie and even meaner to Muriel. People! Will you ever make sense?
But let's rewind and start... right here.
"For once in your life, trust somebody."
No, no, wait, that's too far back. A little further along.
"Fine", Nina says, although it's not. "You've made your point, Mr. Crowley."
Did I? And is my point pointy enough for you to go away, never come back and leave me to my misery?
It certainly seems so, because Nina backs away. "We can offer you our friendship, we cannot, however, make you accept it. I still think you're making a mistake, but the choice is yours, and you're old enough to take responsibility for your own actions."
She falls silent for a moment. The sun's setting with the buildings casting long shadows over the road.
"I'll leave you alone from now on." Nina half turns, looks back over her shoulder. Her features seem calmer than before, but there's still some anger in her eyes. "And Maggie will too, once you explain to her that you don't need or value her friendship. I trust, you will do this soon and won't leave her worrying about you any longer."
What? "Explain to her... what?"
"This. Do you think, ghosting is an appropriate behaviour?"
"I'm not a ghost, 'm a demon."
"Don't take it literal." She sighs. "Ghosting means not answering people's messages and pretending you aren't there. It's very hurtful to others because it leaves people worrying and they never get any closure. That's what you've been doing to Maggie and me and I haven't even started to talk about Muriel."
I didn't know there was a word for it, but I never meant to do anything. How can I do anything by doing nothing? It doesn’t make any sense.
And yet, I know she’s right. Doing nothing sometimes hurts people most of all. Simply standing by and just allowing things to happen.
“What’s that with Muriel? There’s a croak in my voice I can’t supress right now. “I don’t understand, what do they have to do with it?”
“She… wait, Muriel uses “they”? Nina seems surprised. “I assumed since you and Mr. Fell both look like guys and she… they chose to look like a woman... you can all choose what to look like, can’t you?”
Great. Humans are not supposed to know about any of these things. I hope no one tries to erase her memory or turns her into a pillar of salt.
“Yes, we can, but Aziraphale and I have been to Earth for such a long time that we understand the concept of gender. We use the ‘he’ pronoun when we present male and the ‘she’ pronoun when we present female. Most angels don’t know or don’t worry about these things, so they go by “they” unless it feels right for them to go by something else. Muriel has only been to Earth for a couple of months and it’s their first time here, so they wouldn’t worry about gender or pronouns yet. “They” simply makes most sense in their case because it’s neutral and doesn’t assume anything. And before you ask, no, we don’t.”
“You don’t what?”
“Procreate. I thought that would probably be your next question.”
She tilts her head to the side, giving me a long apprehensive look. “So, you’ve had this kind of conversation with humans before.”
“Well... occasionally.” It’s not that I never had closer bonds with humans before. I just try to avoid it because it’s trouble.
Fortunately for me, Nina does not press the point.
Instead, she takes a deep breath and starts talking about Muriel.
~*~
More Diary Parts
1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17 / 18 / 19 / 20 / 21