Aziraphale was never quite the same after the Wilde trials. Crowley had thought he might go into a rebound relationship with another poet, but he never did. The demon would have known. He just tended to be quieter: worked and read more, ate less. Then one day in early December, 1900, Aziraphale disappeared.
Crowley found him a week later in the Cimetière de Bagneux in Paris. He was sitting against a tree staring at a gravestone. Without looking up, he began to speak quietly.
"'And alien tears will fill for him, Pity's long-broken urn, For his mourners will be outcast men, And outcasts always mourn.'" Aziraphale looked up with red-rimmed but dry eyes. "He was a good man."
Crowley silently disagreed but sat down next to Aziraphale. "Yeah, I, uh, heard he converted on his deathbed. Got his last rites and everything. 'Course he also complained about the wallpaper."
Aziraphale laughed weakly. Crowley looked sideways at him through smoked lenses.
"They always die, angel. No matter how smart, witty, or imaginative they are."
"Some of them achieve grace first."
"A few."
"You'll never die and leave me, Crowley."
Crowley wrapped an arm around Aziraphale. "No, angel. I won't."