Chapter Text
A/N: Ok, so hear me out this chapter is sort of slow-ish? But it was necessary to set up the rest of the story. I have an entire intricate plot planned out with this story, but I don’t know if anyone is even remotely interested in reading it. So please let me know if you enjoy it. Also side note I wrote this at 7 am and I have officially been awake 24 hours so please send help.
xxXXXxxx
Things could be better.
A lot better, in fact; if he were being completely honest with himself. Aziraphale, against his own best judgement, fled from home with only a few hundred pounds sitting at a standstill in his bank account. He was twenty-four years old, straight out of university that his father had so generously paid for. Indeed, it was very generous of his father, but it came with a great catch. He had to earn a degree in accounting like his father had wanted him to. Everything up until this point in his life had been what his father wanted him to do.
Aziraphale grew up in a sternly religious household with traditional rules and only a catholic school to attend (there was no room for arguments in this matter and Aziraphale didn’t dare attempt). Every Sunday they attended church like literal clockwork adorned in their finest suits. The Fell family was one of tradition and prided on keeping up good appearances to the public of Tadfield. They were the sort of family that onlookers would say were the epitome of all things normal and moral, but they were anything but happy. The only thing that was perhaps abnormal about them was the lack of a matriarch. Aziraphale’s mother found her husband too dreadful to bear any longer with his large demands and uptight rules. She had run away to the continent to join the gypsies when he was very young. The only thing he truly remembered about her were her exceedingly kind eyes that seemed to eternally smile from within. It was a trait he believed he had inherited. Fittingly, his two older brothers greatly resembled their father and bore no signs of their mother.
He used to blame his mother a great deal for how his father treated him and his brothers. After she had left the situation at home had just gotten that much worse. However, right before he left home he finally made peace with his mother’s decision and understood just how suffocating being near his father could make a person feel. Aziraphale only wished that she had taken him with her.
Despite all odds of getting out of that incredibly toxic household, Aziraphale had finally done it. Right as graduation ended and parents were making their way to greet their newly grads to snap photographs to remember forever; Aziraphale was throwing off his gown and grabbing his suitcase. As he headed for the door, he caught a faint glimpse of his father and brothers’ enraged faces just as he threw the door open.
It had been a month since then. Here he was in London where they say dreams truly can come true. Or possibly that was New York… he never paid much attention to those sorts of things. Ah, well, it didn’t matter anymore. With the money he had saved up through working in a local library, Aziraphale bought an old space just below a flat. The landlord was living in said flat and had no use for the space below that held a shop window and was indeed intended for a shop.
The only problem was the shop was in a state of utter disaster. Aziraphale arrived with high hopes, but the floorboards were popping out from their set placements, the till had to be pried open with a screwdriver, and the paint was chipped off the walls in odd spotty ways. Usually he would complain (more like send a strongly-worded note), but he knew he got what he paid for. It was the sole reason the space was so affordable.
Once he had settled in the backroom of the shop, Aziraphale went to the local flea market and through a bunch of roundabout methods- picked out a great deal of bookshelves and transported them back to the bookshop. It took a few more days for the books from his home to arrive. He had set up accomodations for that before he had left home.
He had been open for about a week now and was hoping that business would be better so he could actually afford to fix all of the issues with the shop or at least put a bathtub in the back room where he now lived.
The back room had a small kitchenette, a mattress he had put on the floor himself, and a square room that kept a toilet and sink. Essentially, Aziraphale found himself taking sink baths. Obviously whenever he bathed he didn’t have an audience, but he felt so humiliated and degraded. He never wished to feel that intimate with his own anatomy. His catholic upbringing wouldn’t permit it.
Aziraphale wiped away a bead of sweat travelling down his temple as he pushed an armchair across the shop, finding that it looked much better in the corner. If other bookworms were anything like himself- corners were extremely comforting. He didn’t really believe that anyone would actually use the chair, though. All of the furniture in the shop was secondhand and most were stained.
“We must work with what we have got, Aziraphale Fell,” he whispered to himself, using his full name as a sort of “he meant business” with himself.
Standing up straight and pressing his palms against his back to pop the knots out, Aziraphale paced to the front window of the shop. He looked out at the passerbys not even so much as paying a glance to his shop. “Oh dear, what am I doing wrong?” he sulked.
Maybe he should have done a better paint job on the sign outside. First impressions are everything, but all that he could afford was the cheap paint you buy for children’s wood crafts. What he suspected to be the neighbourhood watch was already eyeing up his shop. Within three days of moving in he had received a fruit basket with a small note saying that they loved the idea of a new bookshop in the neighbourhood and that they “couldn’t wait to see how you fix it up to fit the rest of the block”. Little did they know, Aziraphale had absolutely no intention of fixing the shop up until he could bathe like a regular human being. The threat came with free fruit though, which was appreciated. It had been his dream to open a bookshop since he was a child and he wasn’t going to make it to the standards of the neighbourhood watch.
He sighed. He was well aware of the fact that he kept making optimistic excuses about his situation to keep up his morale.
Accepting that no one was going to visit his shop today, Aziraphale grabbed his coat off the hook by the door and slipped it on. Grabbing the door handle, he wrenched the thing open and left down the street with his hands in his pockets after locking up. London was definitely something that he had to adjust to. The sheer amount of people on one block rivaled the entire population of Tadfield. Nevertheless, he enjoyed his stroll down to the bakery that he had made sure to scope out when he moved in.
However, as he walked he couldn’t help this feeling that was quickly crawling up his spine.
This feeling of being watched. How strange was that?
It was probably the same simps that sent him the basket if anything.
Approaching a small bakery painted a brilliant shade of red, Aziraphale could smell the baked goods radiating from the building. Ah, there was nothing like a nice blueberry crepe to satisfy his worries. He was afraid that if his stress became too high he may suffer from a premature stroke at this point.
Opening the door, Aziraphale hummed to himself to passify his nerves. The feeling of being watched was still present against the hair on the back of his neck, but he shrugged it away.
“Hello, welcome to Baked Devices,” a woman from behind the counter spoke, bearing a very pretty smile and a distinct American accent.
Aziraphale approached the counter with a small smile of his own. “Hello, there. I’m quite new here, is there anything you would recommend?”
Her smile grew greater, most likely at the prospect of having a new long term customer. However, as Aziraphale gazed at her more he couldn’t help but think she didn’t look like the sort of person that would run a bakery. He couldn’t exactly put his finger on what it was, but she had an air of other worldly-ness to her. The kind of person that you can look at and just see the intelligence burning in their eyes. As if they know some sort of secret you couldn’t possibly ever fathom. Aziraphale got the distinct impression that behind the woman’s round glasses she was indeed holding a deep secret.
“Of course, I would be happy to recommend. Here at Baked Devices we have a large array of baked goods from cookies, to crepes, to muffins, to some Italian classics and so on. What are you in the mood for Mr….?” she drawled off, staring at him very expectantly. Her eyes seemed to zero in on him completely and that feeling of her being of some other world crept back.
Aziraphale didn’t think Londoners were the type to try to be on a name basis with their customers. They were quite aloof people, afterall. “Mr. Fell,” he supplied, “And crepes sound quite lovely, do you have blueberry crepes?”
At this point in conversation, Aziraphale became very aware of someone now standing behind him. He could feel the heat radiating off of the other body and to be able to feel that meant that they were standing quite close. One thing was for sure, Aziraphale never appreciated anyone in his personal space. It was sacred to him. Not only that, but the person behind him was tapping their foot incessantly.
The ladies eyes darted from him to over his shoulder, her smile noticeably dropping before it regained its brilliance when she turned back to him. “Yes, we do. Is that what you would like?”
Aziraphale nodded, fishing out the old, beaten leather wallet out from his pocket. “Yes, please.”
“Ok,” she said, typing something into the till, “that will be four-fifty, please.”
He nodded and handed her the exact amount. She took it and thanked him, informing him it would be right out.
As he stepped away from the counter and from the strange person standing dangerously close behind him, he heard said person behind him speak up to order.
“I’ll take whatever he ordered,” a gruff voice said.
“I didn’t know your type would enjoy blueberry crepes,” she replied shortly, animosity practically seeping out with the smallest amount of effort.
“They are now. Just take the money,” the voice said.
Furrowing his brows, Aziraphale strode across the room to a seat by the window to wait at. Such a strange conversation to overhear. He tried to forget the odd occurrence as he took in the sight of the bakery. It was definitely more grand than anything they had in Tadfield, but it still had that quaint small town feel that he was missing in London despite all of the tables filled with patrons.
A short wait went by when he heard the voice of a different man call out, “Blueberry crepes!”
Aziraphale stood from his stool and approached the counter with a gracious smile directed at a man with short black hair and a long nose occupied by “hipster” glasses. Said man was holding a clear plastic container of two blueberry crepes in his direction.
“Here you are, sir. I hope you enjoy them,” the man said as he handed the box to Azira.
Just as the plastic container reached Aziraphale’s slightly pudgy hand and his mouth watered at the thought of the delicious looking crepes, a long arm clad in black reached over his shoulder and snatched the box from his light grip. “Wha-” he spun on his heel to confront the perpetrator. Aziraphale was about to whirl on whoever dared to be so impolite as to take the container from him.
“I believe this is mine. Thank you, Newt. Always a pleasure,” the man from earlier said with a good amount of pompous ego etched into his voice.
Finally seeing who the gruff voice belonged to, Aziraphale wasn’t quite happy that he had looked. His poor catholic heart could barely take the sight in without feeling a little dizzy. Maybe it was from years of ingrained (brainwashing) distaste for anything that was flashy, but whatever it was the man’s state of….himself just made him incredibly incredulous for some odd reason. There was no reason to be confused, but he was.
The man was about a head taller, all lanky limbs and angled bones. He was adorned from head to toe in black from his snakeskin boots that Aziraphale hoped weren’t real to the opaque sunglasses atop the bridge of his slightly hooked nose. What was most whirling about his appearance, however, was the man’s vivid red hair and a snake tattoo right in front of his right ear. Was that hair colour even natural?
Even though he couldn’t see the other’s eyes through the sunglass lenses, he knew the other was staring back at him just as equally. He felt scrutinized under the intense stare he was receiving.
The man’s lip quirked up and just like that the trance that had befallen them was broken. The man with the red hair turned around and stalked out the door from whence he came along with Aziraphale’s crepes and a sarcastic salute (to whom, he didn’t know).
Now, Aziraphale has put up with a lot of shit in his life. His father’s scrutiny, his brothers’ taunts for being soft and bookish, and the nuns’ abuse for having too many questions. When he bought the bookshop he told himself that he would no longer take anyone’s grief. Not a single soul. So far he hadn’t truly lived up to it. He supposed whether he was in Tadfield or in London, he was still miraculously a pushover. Maybe it was just a part of who he was.
However, Aziraphale has just had one of the worst weeks of his life. His landlord was abrasive and as seedy as expected, he was most probably being stalked by the neighbourhood watch, and now this...this snake man had stolen his crepes.
Biting the inside of his cheek, Aziraphale mustered up all of the courage at his disposal and strode out the door after the man; the door ringed behind him. He stomped right after him down the bustling street.
“Excuse me,” he said.
No response.
A little firmer he said, “Pardon me.”
In an instant, just as Aziraphale was catching up to the man, the target spun around on his heel an inch from him. Aziraphale immediately skidded to a halt and gazed up into the sunglasses of the thief. All courage was now officially gone as he felt like his soul was being bored into by a gaze he still couldn’t see.
“Uhm, hello-”
“Yes?” the man asked with an impatient sigh and quirked brow, regarding Aziraphale like he was some sort of gum that he had just stepped in with his expensive, snakeskin boots.
“Well, you see- uhm” Aziraphale fumbled over his words. He didn’t know what made him think that out of the deepest blue of the godforsaken seven seas that he could just muster up courage from nowhere. At heart he was primarily a gentle being.
The man just rolled his head backwards with a dramatic sigh, “Look, I don’t have time for this. What is it?”
Aziraphale snapped his mouth shut and swallowed his fear in an instant. This man was clearly very rude and he didn’t deserve his pleasantries. “That was my order you stole and I would appreciate it if you returned it to me.”
The red haired man glanced down at the plastic container in his hands and then back to him with disbelief. At first, Aziraphale believed it to be disbelief from him having the courage to tell the man like it was, but it was actually because Aziraphale was being sort of absurd. “You’re telling me instead of taking the next order, you followed me for a block just to demand food that has probably grown cold by now?”
Suddenly Azira felt very, very small.
“Well, yes.... But that is rightfully mine. You grabbed it from my hands like some hooligan.”
The man’s mouth twitched at the corner as if he was about to let out a great burst of laughter and was holding it back. “Did you just call me a ‘hooligan’?”
“I said like a hooligan.”
“Which implies you called me a hooligan, so there we are, then. Let me give you a little life lesson, ok, oldie?” He chided and crossed his arms over his chest, standing up impossibly taller.
Aziraphale was already taking great offense, seeing as this fellow appeared to be at least two years older than he was. Either that or his face was just more worn from the woes of life.
“If you have somewhere to be and people to see, but you want something to nibble on ASAP then you order whatever the person in front of you orders. That way you can get your order sooner and the bloke you left behind pisses off when he gets the next one that comes out. These are the laws of the land, but it seems you just can’t follow them.”
“Where I come from, we do not tolerate such rudeness. I don’t care about any laws made up by sods like you, I want my blueberry crepes,” Aziraphale said as sternly and politely as he could.
The man stared at him with one hip sticking out slightly to the side. For what felt like an absolute eternity, he just regarded Aziraphale. “All right. What’s your name, then?”
“I beg your pardon?” Aziraphale asked. He was growing very tired of this day very quickly. He just wished to return home with his crepes and curl up in his bed, or rather his mattress on the floor.
The man gave another dramatic sigh as if just talking to Aziraphale was draining him. “I asked for your name. In return, I may give you your blasted crepes.”
Aziraphale didn’t quite like the sound of this arrangement. But if it meant getting his crepes finally then sod it all. Hopefully they were still somewhat warm, but he seriously doubted it.
“Aziraphale,” he gave a short glare.
“Aziraphale? What kind of name is that?”
“It’s biblical,” he retorted.
“Ngk, religious then?” the man handed over the crepes which Aziraphale graciously took. “Not really a surprise, I guess.”
“Thank you,” Aziraphale huffed. He didn’t mean it at all. “I’ll be on my way now, if that’s all.”
Before the stranger with the snake tattoo could say another word, Aziraphale was off speed walking back to his shop. As he made his way there he still had the distinct feeling of being watched.
It was an extremely odd day. He wasn’t used to odd.
It was going to become even stranger when he found what was hiding back in his shop.
xxxXxxx
A/N: Please let me know what you think and if you are interested in seeing more! It would really mean a lot and thank you again.