Good Omens

IT WAS A NICE DAY.

All the days had been nice. There had been rather more than seven of them so far, and rain hadn’t been invented yet.

Plan A had worked. Plan B had failed. Everything depended on Plan C, and there was one drawback to this: he had only ever planned as far as B.

“Oh dear,” muttered Aziraphale, not swearing with the practiced ease of one who has spent six thousand years not swearing, and who wasn’t going to start now.

AZIRAPHALE COLLECTED BOOKS. If he were totally honest with himself he would have to have admitted that his bookshop was simply somewhere to store them. He was not unusual in this. In order to maintain his cover as a typical second-hand bookseller, he used every means short of actual physical violence to prevent customers from making a purchase. Unpleasant damp smells, glowering looks, erratic opening hours—he was incredibly good at it.

“Don’t you try to tempt me,” said Aziraphale wretchedly. “I know you, you old serpent.”

The angel turned to Crowley.
“Really, my dear,” he murmured.
“Sorry,” said Crowley. “I was forgetting myself.”

He’d been an angel once. He hadn’t meant to Fall. He’d just hung around with the wrong people.

“Funny if we both got it wrong, eh? Funny if I did the good thing and you did the bad one, eh?”

It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.

"Can we get on?" said Crowley. "Goodnight, miss. Get in, angel."

Ah. Well, that explained it. She had been perfectly safe after all.