Disclaimer: Aziraphale, Crowley, and Good Omens are created and copyrighted by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. This is a fanfic, intended only in the spirit of fun. Tons of love and thanks is owed to the amazing and wonderful Daegaer, who provided tons of feedback for the first half of the fic, and then ended upsomehow volunteering herself as a beta-reader and a proofreader, and who helped me correct many of my Americanisms with proper British English. And thanks to y'all for reading!

NOTE: This chapter has been edited to comply with posting guidelines. An uncensored version of this chapter is available at boukenshin dot net slash crowley.

Ordinary Miracles

by Nenena

Chapter 08

Leavitt, David and Mitchell, Mark, eds. 1997. Pages Passed from Hand to Hand. Houghton Mifflin, Boston. PR1110.G39 P35

Theo would have spent the entire night waiting anxiously for the phone call from Above, had he not cried himself to sleep that evening while being held in Aziraphale's arms.

And the phone call never came.

Aziraphale carried Theo up to his bedroom and laid him down in bed. He returned downstairs and finally got around to playing back the messages on his ansaphone. He found out that Mr. Edwards was returning the next morning to pick up Margie. He fretted and fussed and made several more increasingly frantic and ultimately vain attempts to try to turn Margie back into a female cat, but to no avail. No matter what he tried, he seemed utterly unable to undo what Theo's miracle had done; he only succeeded in once, briefly, inducing a temporary state of hermaphroditism in the poor dog. Margie didn't seem to mind, but Aziraphale was embarrassed enough for both of them to immediately undo that change.

He then spent the night at home, himself waiting for the phone call that never came. He also spent several strange, worried hours staring at his own reflection in a mirror in the back room, frowning at his own face, scrutinizing himself carefully for even the slightest bit of visible change. Based on what he had seen Theo's miracle do to the cat and then to Crowley's car, he was increasingly convinced that it must have done something to change him, too. Which was an extremely uncomfortable thought, because Aziraphale certainly didn't feel changed at all, although he knew that the feeling counted for practically nothing when faced with reality. It was an almost nauseating thought, being filled with the certainty that he had been changed against his will, although he couldn't yet figure out how. Aziraphale shuddered, and could not shake the feeling that he had been somehow violated. He knew enough about how miracles worked to know that if he were behaving abnormally, he would think that his abnormal behavior was perfectly normal, and wouldn't be able to detect anything out of the ordinary about himself.

He spent most of the night stewing about this unpleasant thought, because it kept his mind off the other unpleasant thought that would have otherwise occupied him - the unpleasant thought of his miserable, miserable failing with Theo.

When the sun rose, Aziraphale gave up and decided not to think about anything at all anymore. He made himself a nice pot of coffee and wondered that the phone hadn't rung all night. Was it taking them longer than usual to get their paperwork straight Up There?

Paul Edwards was just finishing up the two most miserable weeks of his entire life.

He normally loved the holiday season. He normally hated his own family. Having spent the entire holiday season shacking up with his own various family members, he could now safely conclude that he would forever hate the holiday season for the rest of his future days, too. It had not helped anything when the only sane and kind-hearted member of his brood, his great aunt Nia, had decided that the week before Christmas would be a good time to go walking down the street and to get run down by a car. That meant that there was a funeral to attend, and Edwards hated funerals. It had also not helped anything that, at the time of her death, Aunt Nia's will had been, shall we say, still a work in progress. It had also not helped anything that, at the time of her death, Aunt Nia had also been, shall we say, the filthiest richest member of Edwards' entire despicable clan. That meant that there were many, many long-lost family members suddenly turning up under the eaves, and they had all brought their solicitors. There had been as many solicitors at Aunt Nia's memorial service as there had been relations. Edwards hated solicitors. Christmas was supposed to have been a time of good cheer and jovial family get-togethers; for Edwards' family, it had been a time of bitter grief, equally bitter in-fighting, jealousy, spite, betrayal, legal conniving, and worst of all, eggnog. Edwards had stayed with his brother, and been forced to drink gallons of his American sister-in-law's homemade eggnog because she was highly emotionally unstable and would break down into tears if he ever refused to eat or drink anything that she had made.

Edwards hated eggnog.

He'd spent two miserable weeks, missing his home, missing his cat, missing his lovely little porn shop, and missing that strange aura of peace and love and goodwill toward men that seemed to permeate the absolutely lovely block of Soho above which he lived. He also felt terrible about imposing Margie upon his kindly gay neighbor in the antique bookshop, cat-lover though he may be. Edwards was well aware of what a handful Margie could be.

Now it was six o'clock in the morning on January 2nd, and Edwards was finally, finally on the road home. He drove his car down the motorways leading into London proper and hummed to himself, cheerfully, looking forward to his happy reunion with Margie that was coming up in the next few hours. He felt good. No, not just good, but downright great - a man confidentially sitting at the start of what he felt in his gut was going to be a very, very good day. His first good day in a long time, in fact. His first good day back home.

Although expecting to have a good day, Mr. Edwards was yet unaware that he was in truth embarking on what was to become the greatest day of his entire life.

At seven o'clock in the morning, Aziraphale was sitting in his back room, reading, and wondering why Heaven hadn't called yet. Surely they'd found out about everything, by now...? They must have; there was only one way that the fiasco could have played out already. Theo's miracle tried to enter Hell; it surely wouldn't have gotten far, but it must have been noticed by at least a few pissed-off demons before it met its fiery demise, and Hell was allowed to file complaints against Heaven if a big enough breach of their security occurred, provided that said breach was an exception from legitimate Good vs. Evil warfare (which this was). Aziraphale knew that demons loved to complain (just look at Crowley). He also knew that demons loved to use any opportunity they could to make Heaven look bad (and this certainly counted as one).

Then why no phone call, not yet?

Aziraphale wondered if he should just call them himself.

Actually, he realized with chagrin, he might have to do so anyway. He was going to have to ask one of the professionals Up There for help with Margie, eventually. He wouldn't have time to do it this morning before Mr. Edwards arrived, however, which presented a problem.

Aziraphale then pondered a new ethical dilemma. Should he tamper with Mr. Edwards' memories to make him believe he'd had a dog all along? Should he tamper with Mr. Edwards' perceptions to make him believe that his dog was still a cat? Should he lie and say that Margie ran away, and then have her magically return to him sometime next week, back in her cat form? Should he just bugger it all and tell Mr. Edwards the truth? Decisions, decisions. He was going to have to think of some devious solution to the problem, though, and quick. Which was problematic in and of itself, because deviousness had never been one of Aziraphale's strong points.

At eight o'clock in the morning, Theo woke up.

This is probably my last morning on Earth, he thought dismally, lying in his bed and staring up at the cracked and water-stained ceiling. They probably already fired me, sometime last night.

But for some reason, he found the motivation to roll out of bed and dress anyway.

He trudged down the stairs and found the angel in the back room, as usual. "So?" he asked.

Aziraphale blinked at him, almost guiltily. "Er, no word."

"What?"

"I haven't heard a peep from Up There all night."

Theo was momentarily taken aback. He hadn't made any other plans for the morning, other than leaving Earth forever. Now, all of a sudden, he didn't know what to do with himself. But then his stomach grumbled noticeably, telling him exactly what it thought he should do.

"Um, if that's the case, then," he said, somewhat embarrassed, "it means that I still have time for a last meal, right? Before I have the spend the rest of eternity eating holy manna, that is."

Aziraphale seemed afraid to look at him, all of a sudden. Instead, he looked away. "I, er, I don't have anything left in this place, not fit to eat, that is. Shall we go out for some breakfast?" And then, "Oh, no, I forgot. Mr. Edwards will be here any minute. I should stay in and wait for him, and--"

"I can go by myself. Should I bring you something back?"

Now Aziraphale did look at him, and the expression on his face was nakedly hurt. "You don't want to go with me?"

Theo sighed. Half frustration, half apology. "I haven't not been anywhere with you for the last two weeks. No offense, or anything. But I sort of... I dunno, I just want some time to make some last memories for myself. If this really is my last morning on Earth, then... You know... I want to spend it out there, with or without you. But definitely not in here. I've spent enough time in here."

"Oh. All right." Aziraphale tried to give him that same wan, trembly smile that Theo remembered from yesterday. "Be careful, though. Look both ways before you cross the street, and, er, don't talk to strangers, and, oh, here, I have some money for you..."

Theo took the money and left as quickly as he could. He couldn't stand another second of listening to the horrible tone of defeat, of resignation, in the angel's voice.

Theo was out the front door of the bookshop at 8:35. He took a deep breath, breathing in the cold January morning air, and set out on his walk. He had every intention of prolonging his walk, and of stopping to eat at the farthest possible restaurant that he could walk to. It was probably his last walk on good old Earth, anyway - he might as well enjoy it.

At 8:45, Paul Edwards parked his car at the curb in front of his shop, and without even stopping off at his own home first, ran straight next door, and stopped in front of the door to the bookshop. It was locked; the sign in the window said 'Closed.' Still, Edwards didn't let that deter him. He knocked as loudly and as rudely on the door as he possibly could, calling out "Mr. Phale! Mr. Phale! It's me - Paul! I've come back for Margie!!"

He thought he heard a dog barking, the sound coming from somewhere within the bookshop. Then he thought, nah.

The door opened, and there stood Mr. Phale, with the most horribly chagrined expression on his face. "Er, hello, Mr. Edwards, good morning, nice day we're having today, isn't it?"

Edwards resisted the urge to push the other man aside. He wanted to see his cat. "Mr. Phale, hi, listen, I'm really sorry about dumping Margie on you for two weeks, but I--"

"--Would like to see her right now?" Mr. Phale stood aside. "Come on in. I'll take your coat. Would you like a spot of tea, something warm to drink? It's terribly cold outside."

Mr. Edwards entered gladly, handed over his coat, turned, and saw the dog.

He gasped. "My word. I didn't know you had such a magnificent dog! St. Bernard, is he? He's lovely. Look at the size of him! Is he new? He must be, I never heard any dogs around here before. I hope he got along all right with Margie. Speaking of Margie... Where is she? Is she outside? Upstairs?"

Mr. Phale hung up Edwards' coat, and then gave him a long, long look.

Then he said, "Mr. Edwards, I'm terribly sorry, but you never had a cat."

"Oh." He blinked. "I guess I didn't." He scratched his head. "Er, what did I come in here for again?"

"Oh, no, that's not right." Mr. Phale clucked his tongue in frustration, then said, "All right, let's try this. You had a cat, a lovely cat named Margie, but she ran away, and--"

"Sh-sh-she ran away?!" Edwards' face fell. He felt his legs begin to wobble beneath him. "Oh... Oh no..."

"No, no, no, I take that back!" Mr. Phale said frantically. "No, no, you do have a cat, her name is Margie, and she's still here, she's just... She's just... Er... She's just... "

Mr. Edwards stared at him, his eyes glazed, his mouth hanging slightly open, breathing slowly and deeply, waiting.

Finally Aziraphale threw his up hands in frustration and told the ceiling above him, "This is pointless! I can't mess with his mind like this. It isn't right! He deserves the truth." Aziraphale turned back toward Mr. Edwards, whose eyes were clearing, who was blinking slowly, dreamily, like a man waking up from a deep slumber. He started gazing around in a slightly befuddled manner, and Aziraphale said, "Mr. Edwards, please, there's something that I have to tell you."

"Hmm?"

"I haven't been, er... During the time that I've known you, I haven't been, er, very honest with you, I'm afraid." He stepped closer to the other man. "I have something that I need to say to you." He took a deep breath. "This isn't easy for me to say, and quite frankly, it's quite forbidden for me to say it to someone like you at all, but I think that, under the circumstances, it's the only thing I can do."

There must have been something on Mr. Phale's face that looked absolutely wretched, because at that moment, despite himself, Edwards stepped closer to the other man, closing the distance between them, and placed his hand on Mr. Phale's shoulder. "Oh, dear," he said softly, "is something the matter?"

Mr. Phale licked his lips. He coughed, softly, clearing his throat. "I have something that I need to confess," he said, somewhat apologetically, even a tad shyly.

And then a funny thing happened.

Aziraphale gazed up into Mr. Edwards' eyes and thought, Oh, my. I never noticed this before, but they really are a lovely shade of brown.

Brown the wrinkled, aging leather binding of his favorite edition of the Buggre Alle This Bible. Brown like the musty fur coat of his favorite horse from the seventeenth century. Brown like the lovely little brown mice that he liked to let run rampant in the shop because they scared away customers, as long as they agreed not to eat any books. Brown like the graceful brown spiders that spun such beautiful webs all over the upper story. Brown like the deep brown caramel glaze baked on top of his favorite sweet rolls from the bakery down the street. Brown like German chocolate cake. Brown like bars of creamy milk chocolate. Chocolate. Chocolate. Aziraphale could think of nothing but chocolate. Good enough to eat. So sweet, so comforting, so seductive, so tempting. So exciting. He felt his breath beginning to come in short little gasps.

For the first time in a long time, Aziraphale realized that his heart was beating.

And now that he had started noticing the amazing beauty of Mr. Edwards' lovely brown irises, he couldn't stop noticing it, that same amazing beauty, built into all the rest of him. His long, brown, golden-blonde eyelashes. The soft, silky strands of his darkish-blonde hair. The way that his soft, lovely skin hugged his face and crinkled and creased in all the right corners. The graceful curve of his nose; the glistening of his lips; the deep shadows of his neck. His earlobes, so coyly asymmetrical, one attached completely to his head, the other waggling daringly free.

It was amazing.

So beautiful, Aziraphale thought, beginning to tremble slightly, So beautiful! Why didn't I ever notice it before?! He's so beautiful. Humans are so beautiful! And suddenly, Aziraphale craved more - more of that incredibly beauty. Suddenly, it wasn't enough just to be standing close to Mr. Edwards and staring at him, drinking him in with his eyes. Aziraphale wanted to experience more of that beauty - to breathe in the scent of his living skin, to run his perfectly-manicured fingers through Mr. Edwards' incredible hair, to taste the salt on his flesh with his own two lips, to--

"Mr. Phale, are you all right?"

Like chocolate, he thought, and then he couldn't stop himself anymore.

Aziraphale raised his hands. With one hand he ran his fingers through Mr. Edwards' hair; with the other, he softly touched Mr. Edwards' cheek. The touch was electric, jolting. He could feel things through Mr. Edwards' bare skin that no human hands could ever feel. He touched the thirteen-dimensional pricklings of Mr. Edwards' soul, and found himself only craving more, more.

More touch. More contact. Closer. More.

Aziraphale barely registered the way that Mr. Edwards' eyes were widening. "Your eyes," he whispered, his breath tickling against Mr. Edwards' face. "They're like chocolate."

And then Aziraphale kissed him.

The funny thing about miracles is, they can change people in ways that prevent them from ever realizing that they had ever been changed. Aziraphale had practiced enough miracling over the years to know this fact well; in fact, that had been the cause of most of his worrying last night.

Aziraphale, as a general rule, didn't like to muck around with the type of miracles that could actually alter or change a human's personality. He felt that most of the time, that was unethical. He was perfectly fine with healing the sick and providing to the poor, those types of miracles were always good in his books. But forcibly changing the way a human would think or feel? That was just plain cheating. Aziraphale always said that he preferred humans to solve their own problems, to work to save their own souls; he could provide guidance and encouragement, and was always willing to give a bit of angelic advice (or a self-righteous lecture, as Crowley would have called it). But it was so much better when humans actually took it upon themselves to improve themselves and the world around them.

Crowley understood this principle; it was one of the few things that they agreed upon. Crowley knew perfectly well how important it was to encourage humans to damn their own souls. Oh, sure, he was usually quite willing to muck around with their brains and pull a few of what he called Jedi Mind Tricks every now and then. But that, he insisted, was just when he was having fun (or trying to get a rise out of Aziraphale). He never considered any of that business to be his serious work.

This was why, during the two previous weeks, Aziraphale had resolved to himself that he would never teach Theo any sort of codes that could let him do such dastardly things as alter the minds and hearts of humans. Their goal, as angels, was to change human behavior by really touching human hearts, through good deeds, kind words, and righteous examples. They were above resorting to cheap shortcuts.

Still, Aziraphale should have realized by then that what he had and hadn't taught Theo so far in no way limited the type of codes that Theo had accidentally, and spontaneously, built into his mutant miracle the previous day.

And Aziraphale definitely hadn't taught Theo the incredibly complex and sophisticated coding that was required to produce a variable time-delayed effect, either.

Paul Edwards, in all his years of swinging, had never, ever, not ever once had an experience that caused him to question his avowed heterosexuality.

By the time the angel's tongue was sliding into his mouth, however, all he could think was, Fuck being straight.

Fuck indeed.

Despite whatever conclusions most people tended to draw about the sexual life of Paul Edwards, based on the naked woman constructed of neon pink tube lighting hanging in the front window of his little porn shop, the truth of the matter was, it was a lot less exciting than most people tended to assume.

In his younger years, that had been different. He had once been an active member of the industry and still had many close friends working on the production side of the business; however, as the decades had worn by, he had been increasingly content to limit himself to merely selling what others created. It was not that, as he aged, he had become any less attractive; he still had his natural hair color, all his teeth, a beautiful face, that lady-killer smile. But as he had aged he had simply found himself yearning for a slower, more peaceful life. Less excitement. Less emotional stress. Less histrionic prima-donna porn stars to deal with.

Still, he liked to consider himself a knowledgeable critic of the wares he sold. He watched a lot of porn.

He was currently finding himself embroiled in Generic Porn Video Scenario Number Five. (He kept a mental list of fifteen.) This one was The Normally Unassuming and Seemingly Innocuous Yet Suddenly Incredibly Sexy and Seductive Neighbor Next Door. Usually said neighbor was supposed to a be a sexually suppressed housewife, who would usually do at least one of the scenes wearing nothing but a lacy little apron tied around her front.

A dealer of rare and out-of-print books, however? That had never been done before, at least not to Edwards' knowledge.

Wait a minute... Didn't I actually come here to pick up my cat?

That thought was instantly banished from Edwards' brain the moment Mr. Phale slid his exquisitely manicured hand down into Edwards' trousers. Mr. Phale was also making the loveliest little gasping moans into Edwards' mouth.

Despite whatever conclusions most people tended to draw about the sexual life of Mr. Azira Phale, based on the way he dressed and the way he spoke and the way that he seemed to exhume gayness from his pores, the truth of the matter was, it was actually a lot more nonexistent than most people tended to assume. This was because Aziraphale was an angel.

It was very clear, in Heaven's rulebook, that consorting between angels and humans was not forbidden, per se, but it did involve quite a lot of heavy breathing and usually the exchange of bodily fluids, which most angels were positively squeamish about. Aziraphale didn't mind breathing every now and then, but he was, just like any other angel, somewhat wary of any part of the human body that squished or squirted. Quite frankly, he'd never been able to see what all the fuss was about, and, to be perfectly honest, he'd never once, in all of his many centuries on Earth, felt any particular desire to make the effort to try it out himself.

There were just other, more interesting, things to occupy his attention with. Like books, and ducks, and the occasional sushi bar, and keeping Crowley in line.

Aziraphale had simply never tried anything like that before.

Neither, for that matter, had any other angel that had ever graced God's green Earth.

Well, that was all right, then. Aziraphale somehow usually found himself in the position of making historical firsts.

They whirled around the shop, kissing passionately, and crashed into a bookcase. Mr. Edwards pulled away from the kiss just long enough to gasp, "Bed!"

"What?" Mr. Phale took the opportunity to lick Mr. Edwards' neck.

"Let's go -- up to your bed, right?"

"Don't have a bed," Mr. Phale mumbled, his mouth full of Mr. Edwards' earlobe (the wiggly free one, so delicious).

"We can't - oh! - can't do it here. There's the window in front - anyone on the street can see us--"

"No they can't," Mr. Phale said, and with a thought, it was so.

"Not clean here - there's dust everywhere - oh, oh, OH! That feel, uhn, hmm, good--"

"I won't let any dirt touch you." Mr. Phale forced Edwards down onto the floor. Dusty, hard, and wooden - at least, that's what Mr. Edwards' brain told him it was supposed to feel like. But it didn't. The floor suddenly felt amazingly soft and comfortable, like lying on a bed without lying on a bed.

Mr. Phale's elegant hands were undoing Edwards' belt as Mr. Phale sat up, straddling Edwards' hips. Edwards was trying to form a coherent thought in his brain, but it was increasingly difficult. Mr. Phale's skin smelled like cinnamon toast and his hair like tea with cream and lemon. He finished with pulling down Mr. Edwards' boxers, then quickly got to work on his own clothes. He was humming a tune low in his throat, something that Edwards vaguely recognized as a church hymn. Oooh, kinky.

"Paul," Mr. Edwards finally croaked. "Call me Paul."

"I beg pardon?" Mr. Phale flipped off his last layer of shirt. Edwards sucked in his breath. Mr. Phale's chest was gorgeous, perfect, beautiful, sculpted, not hard and obvious like the statue of David, but that was immediately the image that came to Edwards' mind, that impossible stone perfection, only this was softer and more real, so beautiful--

"Like an angel," he sighed.

"Yes, well, have to keep the upper body muscles in good shape. For the wings, of course. And those flaming swords are heavy."

But it was so surprising. Edwards had always assumed that his neighbor was, well, old. He seemed to radiate an aura of oldness - Edwards had somehow always felt that he was old enough to be his father. But now, peering up at his flushed, smiling face, Edwards saw that his curly-haired neighbor wasn't old at all. He was even a bit younger than Edwards himself - at least, there was nothing in the soft, smooth lines of his face that would indicate otherwise.

Still, there was that feeling, that pervasive feeling, that sense of oldness--

As if sensing his thoughts, Mr. Phale winked at him and said coyly, "A gentleman does not divulge his age." He leaned forward and down, and kissed Edwards on the lips again, deeply, passionately. His fine curly hair, lightly scented with tea and lemon, brushed against Edwards' scalp. "Paul," he moaned into Edwards' mouth. "Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul." He trailed kisses down Edwards' neck, causing him to arc his back and moan. "Paul, that was always one of my favorite names."

"And your name," he managed to gasp, "Mr. Phale?"

"Just Aziraphale," he said, and then resumed kissing Edwards' neck.

"Aziraphale Phale?" Edwards' tongue stumbled over the syllables. He felt as if his brain had migrated significantly south and he now seemed capable of thinking only with his other head.

A laugh. "No, that would be too silly. I'm Just Aziraphale."

"I never heard a name like Aziraphale before," Edwards said. It was the first whole, coherent, grammatically correct sentence he had been able to string together since the kissing had started.

"It's foreign."

"Ah."

"Hmm." Aziraphale made a ponderous sound, low in his throat, then straightened up again, and decided apparently to finished unclothing himself before going any further.

Edwards was blushing furiously all over his body. "I, um," he said, fighting to get his breath back, "I've never done this with another man before."

"Don't worry. Neither have I."

"But... You're so... forward..."

"I love you, Paul Edwards." Aziraphale gave him a brilliant, glowing smile. "I love all of God's creatures. Love love love love love. I love you so much I want to taste you, and touch you, and smell you, and hear you, and--"

As he said this, he finished pulling down the last of his undergarments. Edwards took one look at the impressively-sized equipment unveiled, and gasped faintly, "Holy..." He'd meant to say holy shit, but all of a sudden, he was overwhelmed by the desire to not use any foul language in front of his new lover.

Again, Aziraphale gave him that brilliant smile. "Yes, holy. Exactly."

His hands descended upon Edwards's shoulders, and before Edwards could protest, he found himself being flipped over onto his stomach.

Sometime later, Paul Edwards found himself lying naked, in a cooling puddle of his own sweat, on the dusty floor of the bookshop next door. It was still morning. His extraordinarily beautiful and seductive neighbor was lying beside him, holding his hand, smiling brilliantly in the general direction of the ceiling. Edwards was fairly sure that the enormous dog was lurking somewhere nearby, watching them attentively.

"Wow," said Mr. Edwards.

"Wow," he said again.

"Wow," he said a third time, for lack of anything better to day.

That was the best sex he'd ever had. And he'd had a lot.

And then he said, "You know, this is kind of crazy, but I feel the sudden urge to go read the Bible."

Aziraphale beamed at him. "Congratulations, Paul. You've got the Holy Spirit."

Edwards turned his gaze toward the ceiling. It looked somewhat dirty, but he no longer cared. "You know what else?" he asked slowly. "I think I love Jesus."

Aziraphale also turned his smile back up toward the ceiling again. "Which is interesting, really," he said, pausing to scratch the side of his nose. "I suppose it's a bit of a side effect, if you will. Fascinating, really. I never expected that I could, doing this, have that kind of an effect on people. Absolutely fascinating. I'd just, er, I'd just never tried this with anybody before. Well. Who knew?"

Edwards felt his head swimming. "What are you talking about?" he asked fuzzily.

"Paul Edwards, I just Saved your immortal soul." And then, almost apologetically, "I never expected that to happen, mind you, but now that it has, aren't we both the better for it?"

Edwards rolled over slightly and stared at his neighbor, drinking in the sight of his lovely, pale, nude body with his eyes. It was strange, really. For some reason he'd always thought of Aziraphale as old, and slightly fat. But the person that he was looking at now was, although certainly no green twig, at least not nearly as ancient as Edwards had always assumed he would be. And not fat, either. Not even really pudgy. There were such smooth, well-developed, wonderfully-shaped muscles lining his entire body. Like David, Edwards thought again, and then quickly pushed that thought out of his head. No, that was wrong. Not like David at all - Aziraphale was softer, less sculpted, but somehow more real, and more perfect, because of it. Perfection. Yes, now that he looked hard, Edwards could see that it was true. There was a layer of soft flesh and perhaps even a bit of flab smoothing over the strong muscles beneath the skin. But why had he ever thought that Aziraphale was actually fat? Maybe it had something to do with his short height, or his stubby fingers (which really were somewhat pudgy), or his button nose, or the way that he always seemed to be wearing thirteen or so layers of clothing. Yes, thought Edwards with some amusement, it was probably all an effect of the thirteen or so layers of clothing, more so than anything else. Once the clothes came off, it was as if an entirely different person had been underneath, all along.

"You're so beautiful," Edwards said, bending over to brush his lips against Aziraphale's cheek. "Why all the camouflage?"

"Camouflage?"

"All that clothing." Edwards sighed. "I mean, look at you. You could be a model. Or a pin-up. Or a centerfold." Perfection, he thought again. It was the little imperfections of Aziraphale's body - the squat height, the stubby fingers, the button nose - that seemed to combine to make him even more beautiful than he would have been otherwise.

Aziraphale gazed up at him with his amazingly clear blue eyes. "Yes, well, we angels generally tend toward being nice to look at," he said without a trace of modesty.

"I love a guy with a sense of humor." Edwards rolled over and sat up. He winced, stretching. He should, he realized, have been absolutely filthy - the dirt-crusted floor that his sweaty flesh had been lying against was certainly filthy enough. But he was as clean as a whistle, albeit not at all dry.

"Oh," said Aziraphale, "Are you going?"

"I should clean off--"

"But I want more," he suddenly said, plaintively, sitting up beside Edwards and reaching out to grasp his arm. "This is too good to stop now! It's my first time doing this and I never knew - I never knew! - it could be so good. This is too lovely! I need more, I need--"

Edwards placed a finger against Aziraphale's lips and said, "Hush." Aziraphale fell silent, but there was still something hungry in his eyes. Insatiable, Edwards thought with amusement. Stereotypical Porno Movie Character Trait Number Six. He kept a mental list of ten. "Listen... This is lovely, but, I'm getting old, I can feel it right now more than ever, and I don't know if my ticker could take another, er, another, you know, not if it's with you."

Aziraphale cocked his head at Edwards in an adorably curious gesture. "Oh, I didn't mean with you."

Edwards was momentarily taken aback with the bluntness of the statement.

"I meant," Aziraphale continued, "I must do this with more humans. I've already Saved your soul. But there are so many other lovely people out there, so many other souls to Save, and I want to touch them all, I want to taste them all, I want to--"

By now, Edwards was grinning. "You want to spend some quality time exploring your sexuality? You've come to the right guy. I know people... I could hook you up with the right people, if you'd like."

"I thought as much." A sly, knowing smile. "So let's do it. Let's go. Now."

"Er, right this moment?"

"Yes, absolutely. I must start right away."

"You really are something, you know that?" Edwards sighed, but it was a soft little sigh of contentment. "All right, fine. Let's get some clothes on, I'll make some phone calls. Are you absolutely certain that you'd like to try some more, er, casual encounters?"

"Yes. Yes. Oh, yes." Aziraphale's grin was starting to become slightly maniacal. "I love all of God's creatures. I should Save all of God's creatures." He was hugging himself, and if Edwards didn't know any better, he'd even say that his neighbor was glowing a bit. Aziraphale seemed enraptured by the ecstasy of his own thoughts. "There's so much beauty, so much love in the world! I want to take it all in, I want to try it all out, I want to feel it all over me, I want to be touching it with my entire body, I want to Save all the poor beautiful souls in the world..."

"Right. Um, okay." Edwards began pulling on his shirt, and fumbled in one pocket for his wireless phone.

Not less than fifteen minutes later, they were both fully dressed and ready to leave. As Edwards took Aziraphale's hand and pulled him out the front door, he was amazed to see that, with all of his clothes back on, the other man looked just as short and fat and old and unassuming as he ever had. "You know," Edwards said, with some amazement in his voice, "I never, ever would have pegged you as the type to go for this sort of stuff. Never in a million years."

"You don't look it, either," Aziraphale laughed lightly. "Paul Edwards, my normal, unassuming, buttoned-up next-door neighbor. Who would have ever thought that you led such a beautifully wild sexual life?"

"I told you, I haven't, not for years," Edwards said again as he led Aziraphale to his car, still parked at the curb. "These are just some old friends of mine I'd like to introduce you to. Some of them are the industry, you know, but don't let that deter you, they would never dream of exploiting--"

"The industry?" Aziraphale's ears perked up instantly. "What industry?"

By that time, both of them were sufficiently distracted to have both forgotten something terribly important. Edwards had forgotten entirely that he had ever stopped by Aziraphale's home to pick up his long-ago left behind cat. Aziraphale, for his part, had completely and utterly forgotten about his apprentice Theo, whom he had sent off for breakfast sometime earlier that morning...

...And who had never yet returned.

Had he been in his right state of mind, Aziraphale would have been worried. In fact, he would have been more than worried - he would have been smart enough to know for a certainty that something had just gone terribly, terribly wrong.

But, thanks to Theo's little miracle, Aziraphale was no longer entirely in his right state of mind. And he was slipping further and further from it by the minute.

If something hadn't gone terribly, terribly wrong when Theo had been walking back to the bookshop after his late breakfast that morning, he would most definitely have walked right in on the angel and his neighbor copulating furiously all over the dust-covered floor of the main area of the shop, a scenario which would have created a whole new and quite interesting set of problems.

Fortunately enough, Theo never made it back to the bookshop. Because something went terribly, terribly wrong.

He was walking back home along the crowded, slushy sidewalk when a large hand suddenly descended out of nowhere and grabbed the collar of his coat, forcibly yanking him back into the shadows of a dark alleyway. Theo cried out - he gave a great, big, bellowing yell of protest, in fact. But not a soul seemed to notice. The humans kept walking back and forth along the sidewalk, not a single one of them even batting an eyelash at the sight of the young boy being pulled into the alley or at the sound of his frightened cry.

Theo felt himself being spun around roughly, and then his face was slammed painfully into a cold brick wall. Dirty snow piled up in a drift around his legs. "YOU!" a furious voice accused him, a voice lower and deeper and more terrifyingly inhuman than any Theo had ever heard before.

Oh, thought Theo, suddenly feeling more frightened and confused and horrifyingly angelic than he ever had before in his entire afterlife, Oh, dear.

Continued.