Aziraphale's heart remained at a dizzying height from that moment, as the show continued and the people around him became more and more animated, at first swaying and then dancing riotously to the humming guitar and brassy drums.

In his wide-eyed state of panic or something like it, he allowed himself to be carried with the motion of the crowd, even jumping in time to the song as his eyes remained ever-fixed on the bronze-haired, bespectacled man keening out the lyrics:

They take away our freedom
In the name of liberty
Why can't they all just clear off
Why can't they let us be
They make us feel indebted
For saving us from hell
And then they put us through it
It's time the bastards fell!

The noise and light and movement all around him was intoxicating, and it seemed like hours and hours later when the last cymbol vibrations died away. The singer threw the microphone down in a hum of feedback and blew a kiss at the roaring crowd with a sharp-toothed grin as he disappeared off stage. A hum of conversation replaced the waves of electronic noise in Aziraphale's ears; it was like standing next to a jet engine that had just been turned off. He was dripping with sweat, and his body felt like it belonged to someone else.

"—Hey! Earth to 'Ziraphale!"

Brian nudged him, and Aziraphale jumped, realizing that his friend had been trying to get his attention. "Oh, sorry!" he shouted over the din.

"You okay?"

"Yes," he said a bit too loudly in reply. "It was louder than I thought it would be. I've...never been to a show like this before."

He didn't like the look in Brian's or Heather's eyes when they glanced at each other and smiled—and liked it even less when Heather grabbed his sleeve and dragged him towards a roped-off hallway near the corner of the stage.

"W-where are we going? This isn't the way we came in!"

"C'mon, we're going to go say hi to the band."

"Wait, I don't think we're allowed—but—"

His words died in his throat as Brian rapped briefly on the door and entered, followed by Heather, still dragging Aziraphale. The room was a combination of dressing room and lounge, with large but grimy mirrors, ragged Oriental carpets, and well-worn furniture—across which the band's members were sprawled, resting with cold bottles of beer at hand and laughing at something.

"Brian! Hey, man." The bassist stood to give Aziraphale's roommate a tight hug, causing Brian to laugh and shove him away.

"Dude, you got sweat all over me, gross!"

"Whatever," the bassist replied, collapsing back onto a well-padded armchair. "Good to see you. Who're your friends? I'm Chuck, by the way."

"This is Heather, don't think you've met before. And Aziraphale, he's from abroad. You two, I've known Chuck since… like, forever. That's Steve and Kyle over there," Brian said, gesturing to the guitarist and drummer, who raised their beers in greeting. "And that's Crowley."

Crowley, he of the leather pants and wicked grin and flaming hair, was sprawled wide-legged across the sagging couch. For a moment, he seemed to be asleep, completely unmoving, but suddenly he coiled himself up to stand beside them in a quick, sinuous movement.

Aziraphale's mind had apparently at this point given up, packed its bags, and hailed a cab. They were all looking at him after Heather had waved hello, so he did the first thing that came to mind and thrust out a hand to shake while offering a beaming, if somewhat panicked, smile.

Crowley looked down at the proffered hand for a moment, then at Aziraphale's face, then shrugged and stuck out his own hand, its nails painted a fading black, for a quick shake.

As they pulled their arms back, Brian laughed and said, "I think he's a bit nervous. This is his first show." Aziraphale could feel the mortified blush rising on his round cheeks.

"Oh, how'd y'like it?" Crowley was looking at him and talking to him and would his brain please return to its rightful state and help him here—

"It was...loud. Er, louder than I'm used to. But I liked it," he rushed to add, relieved he'd been able to form actual, understandable words. And Crowley smirked, tight-lipped, before Heather yawned and stretched beside them.

"Was nice to meet you, but we're gonna miss the bus if we don't get back, guys," she said.

They left the band to their alcohol-assisted recovery and made their way outside, where the air cooled their sweat and caused shivers at the sudden change in temperature. By the time they trudged off the bus and parted ways with Heather, Brian and Aziraphale were both beset by jaw-cracking yawns.

After a quick shower that felt absolutely heavenly, Aziraphale slid into his borrowed sleeping bag with a contented, tired sigh. His body felt wrung out as the onslaught of adrenaline that had coursed through his veins finally faded. But while Brian was already snoring, Aziraphale stared up at the dorm room's ceiling.

Crowley. It was a name with bite, a crisp mouthful that set his insides into a tumultuous roil. He thought about the sharp angles of Crowley's hips and the confident smirk of his mouth, and the smooth, dry skin of his hand grasping Aziraphale's own. These were pleasant thoughts.

But the thoughts that crept in beside them in the quiet dark were not so welcome. A familiar shame and self-loathing and sorrow stained him, wrapping into a knot that he shied away from untangling. Besides, a man like that probably has a girlfriend, he told himself. Maybe even several girlfriends. You're a small, fat, strange boy who likes books and tea and…

He closed his eyes and inhaled slowly and deeply, mentally flipping through Bible pages in search of comfort. Isaiah 26:3—"You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you"... Aziraphale followed his thoughts through the verse, breathing deep, until he drifted softly to sleep.


Aziraphale spent most of the weekend trying to distract himself. It mostly worked.

Brian was off skateboarding, and Aziraphale begged off attending a party with Heather and her boyfriend Saturday night. He spent the day at the library instead, poring over various tomes and marveling that he was allowed to bring his Thermos full of tea with him. At home, the local librarian had kept a stern, hawklike eye out for any consumables or liquids, lest the collection of frankly shabby books in their crinkling plastic covers end up damaged under her watch. Ms. Device, in contrast, raised her eyebrows at him when he had tentatively asked permission, then reminded him with a motherly smile that he was in college now and also seemed quite responsible anyway. Next time, she said, he might even bring some biscuits, as long as he promised to share.

Sunday was gloomy and rainy, but he woke early anyway to dress for church in a pair of dove grey trousers, the red tie again, an eggshell marled shirt, and his khaki coat. The pavement outside was treacherously slick, but he stepped carefully and managed to make it to the front steps of the church without incident.

Like the library, the building was more opulent than the one at home, although this one looked to be similar in age to the stark white house of worship Aziraphale's family managed. Although chipped and dusty, the painting across the lofted ceiling was captivating, depicting the life and death of Christ, who gazed benevolently down at the pulpit from a mass of fluffy white clouds and sunbeams. The pews creaked with age as worshippers shifted, whispering softly to one another.

That day, the preacher had chosen to speak about weakness and resisting temptation, with many a side-eyed glance at the hungover college student strong armed into attending by their own parents from afar.

"But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me," the preacher recited. "Now I think that's a message we can all take to heart today. We can tell the Lord our sins, because he already knows all of them and he'll forgive us anyway, no matter what." Aziraphale glanced down at his folded hands.

After the service, he introduced himself to the pastor, a rotund man named Clive Honeycutt who liked to feed ducks at the pond in a nearby park. He taught some of the higher-level theology courses and suggested a few to Aziraphale to consider for the next semester before patting him gently on the back in farewell, promising to chat further at the theology mixer later that week, and looking to the next of several parishioners waiting to speak with him.

When he returned to his room, Brian was chewing on a piece of beef jerky and looking through the milk crate that held his cassette tape collection. "Hey, 'Ziraphale! You're looking fancy. I can't find my Cure tape, wanna come with me to Zedd's? It's the music store," he added, seeing Aziraphale's blank expression.

"Oh! Why, that would be nice. Shall we catch the 2 o'clock bus?"

They did, finding themselves outside of the aforementioned Zedd's Music Emporium a half hour later. Inside, Aziraphale was reminded of an independent bookstore, only instead of books crammed onto every shelf and stacked on the floor and displayed with colorful, handwritten price signs, there were cassettes and records. The back wall displayed several autographed guitars, as well as signed concert posters, and there were a few listening booths near the back door. The gloomy, pale light from the large front window was assisted by strings of fairy lights woven along the shelves. A grizzled, balding man in a faded band t-shirt sat on a stool behind the counter, grunting at them when they came in without looking up from his magazine.

Aziraphale continued to look around as he followed Brian, seeing nothing he recognized. His father was strictly against popular music, preferring classical compositions or hymns played on their ancient record player that lived on a spotless shelf in the living room.

As Brian searched, Aziraphale browsed aimlessly beside him… until he had an idea. "Your friend's band, what was it, The Doomsday Option? Do they have any tapes here?" he asked his friend, feigning casualness.

"Oh, yeah, I bet they do—Zedd's big on promoting local stuff. Check farther down, it would be with the Ds."

He did, and there was, and soon he was paying for his very first cassette tape, and Brian promised that he could borrow his Walkman whenever he wanted until Aziraphale could get his own. They were expensive, but Brian knew a good thrift store they could check out that was unfortunately closed on Sundays.

When they got back to campus, Aziraphale patiently accompanied Brian to the dining hall (dinner was chicken a la king, but the featured dessert was a scrumptious chocolate mousse) before oh so politely asking Brian to borrow the Walkman.

While Brian was showering, he grabbed it and the tape and strode to the ground-floor bathroom (thankfully empty) and locked himself in one of the stalls. He popped the tape out of the case, which was decorated with a black and white photograph of the band leaning against a brick wall, middle fingers raised towards the camera and cigarettes dangling from sneering lips. "The Doomsday Option" was scratched across the top of the photo. On the reverse, there was a typed list of track times, next to song names like "Suspect Device" and "Don't Tell Me to Move".

Aziraphale drew the headphones on, pushed the tape into the Walkman, and listened as the riffs of a guitar flooded his ears and then Crowley's voice:

I'm dead on arrival
I'm a horror unseen
I'm unlikely survival
I'm the worst that you've seen…

Goosebumps rose on his skin as he finished the song, then the next and the one after that. The snarl of Crowley's voice, the passionate disdain, took the air from his lungs and dazzled him as he listened with closed eyes and bated breath. He could picture the temptation of Crowley strutting on the stage, pulling the microphone on its stand in close to snarl the words in that drawling accent.

But the creak of a pipe overhead in the silence after the third song startled his eyes open, and he realized that he'd been hiding in a bathroom stall for close to 20 minutes. He stopped the tape and stood, clearing his throat and adjusting the front of his trousers as he made his way back upstairs.

A cold shower helped drown out the hum of the music still trapped in his brain. Mostly.


The next few weeks offered Aziraphale little time to do much other than study and collapse into bed. After the leisurely pace of the first week of classes, each of his teachers now began piling on work. Aziraphale's left hand cramped from taking copious notes, and he had a perpetual smear of ballpoint pen on his hand, despite flipping his notebooks to adjust to his southpaw writing. He spent his nights reviewing his notes for upcoming math quizzes that were already approaching fast, writing up short essays for his theology class, and studying homemade nutrition flashcards.

His fencing footwork had progressed reasonably well, although he was still nowhere near as agile as many of his classmates. He left each class drenched in sweat and ravenous, devouring dinner as though he was starving while Heather and Brian wolfed theirs down beside him. Heather was studying multimedia art, and her class was already preparing for their first campus show, so she was often in the studio for long hours when she wasn't with them or Dave. Brian was less busy but still growing, he told them, as he took extra helpings of dinner, yet avoided gaining weight in a way that Aziraphale was infinitely jealous of.

In addition to chatting further with Pastor Honeycutt, he met a few new acquaintances at the theology school mixer. One of them was a pale-haired girl named Mary who spoke quietly with him about books for a few minutes over coffee (or, in his case, cocoa). She mentioned that she had recently found a book that claimed talking to plants helped keep them happy, which it turn helped them grow more lush and vibrant. When Aziraphale confessed that he'd never owned a plant before, much less conversed with one, she wrote down the name of a plant shop downtown, explaining the basics of indoors-tolerant houseplants and the benefits of having a few in one's dorm.

Aziraphale had taken the paper and thanked her politely but forgotten about it until later that weekend, when more rain drizzled outside. He'd found himself staring out at the drops rather than paying attention to his grammar textbook and decided he needed a break.

The bus was remarkably crowded for a weekend; apparently some sporting event was taking place despite the rain. The crush of people made him nervous and uncomfortable, and he breathed a sigh of relief when he finally reached his stop.

The plant store was tucked down a side street, buckets of greenery collecting rain under the fogged bay window. A chiming doorbell played as he stepped inside, tapping his umbrella to dispel the water droplets onto the entryway mat.

Every surface of the shop, from floor to ceiling, was covered in plants: Sitting in pots, hanging in baskets, nestled on shelves and counters and the windowsill. The air smelled of soil and moisture and the perfume of lush flowers.

He had greeted the woman at the counter, then wandered the store, picking up and studying one plant after another. Aziraphale examined their handwritten labels to see if they contained guidance on what sort of plant would be best for the dry air of his dormitory.

He turned to head back to the shopkeeper and ask about the plant he held, something called a pothos, and collided with someone. Juggling the plant and the umbrella, he managed to grab the latter. He gaped in horror, frozen, as he watched the plant on its collision course with the floor, but Crowley caught the pot just before it landed and rolled back up to grin at him from behind his dark glasses.

"Well, that was close."


Chapter notes:

Song lyrics from "Suspect Device" by Stiff Little Fingers
Bible verse is
2 Corinthians 12:9