“You’re reading an awful lot,” Muriel observes, sitting on the stairs and watching Crowley sprawled out in an armchair with a paperback in one hand, held in a way that would infuriate Aziraphale. It’s a small joy, breaking in a spine, dog-earing a page, thinking about leaving notes in margins but wondering if it’s too far. He can’t wreak that much havoc with the possibility of having the glorious Archangel Aziraphale within close smiting range.
“I’m trying to figure something out,” Crowley murmurs.
“. . .stories,” he says, vaguely, after a long moment of staring at the ceiling trying to reign his thoughts in. “Beginnings, middles, endings. You know.”
“I do know!” Muriel says, happily. “Do you know how many books I’ve read?”
“Five hundred and thirty two,” Crowley says, dutifully. “It’s impressive. Gold star.”
“Thank you,” they say, getting up to go over and perch on the arm of his chair, reading over his shoulder. “What do you want to find out?”
“How somebody who reads so many goddamn books,” Crowley says, clenching his fingers a little too intensely considering the book is still in them, “could pick such an objectively bad ending.”
Muriel looks at him with wide eyes for a second before they say, sighing, “Oh, this is about Aziraphale again.”
“. . .no,” Crowley says, scowling at them.
They pat him gently on the back before getting up and walking over to a shelf to immediately grab a book. Muriel has been reorganizing the whole shelf based on her own system which is, frankly, ineffable. Aziraphale will love it.
“Read this one,” they say. “Trust me. Actually, wait--"
They return the book carefully to its place and come back with a paperback instead.
"That was a first edition," they says. "Based on how you're treating that book, I think maybe we should stick with replaceable things."
He's accidentally set a few books on fire but has immediately either fixed them or taken the ashes an hour out of town to dispose of them, just in case. Can't be too sure.
"Oh, god, Jane Austen," he groans, sliding so low in his chair that he's almost on the floor.
"Pride and Prejudice," Muriel says, brightly. "I know I'm not the most astute with emotions and the more human stuff that the two of you were up to but I think it's actually rather silly you didn't start with this one. It was the blueprint, wasn't it?"
"For you," they say. "The story it should have been. With the ball? And the dancing? And your grumpiness comes into play. It all adds up, really."
Crowley flips open the book then freezes.
"Holy shit," he says, softly.
"He wrote in it," Crowley says.
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