Work Text:
For a night, the bookshop was gone, and Heaven was conspiring to kill him. And for a night, Aziraphale had one constant, or perhaps he had only ever had one and only recognized that now, here at the end of it all.
Crowley was slumped in his bedroom doorway, exhaustion heavy on his thin shoulders. Waning sunlight filtered over them from the flat’s impressive windows and washed Crowley in a warm glow.
The sun was setting on a day that should never have ended, and Aziraphale found himself at a loss for what that meant. He stared at Crowley from the couch, feeling quite small.
“You’ll be fine?” Crowley said finally.
“Oh, yes, I’ll be quite alright for the evening,” Aziraphale said, as cheerfully as he could manage. Crowley looked suspicious but apparently decided not to probe further.
“Night then,” he said, and paused, reconsidering. “There’s not much they could do to us besides what they’re already going to. Cheers.”
With that, he turned and slipped out of the room. Baffled, Aziraphale smiled a little. Crowley was terrible at comforting with his strange brand of optimism, but it warmed him all the same.
Aziraphale settled into the uncomfortably modern cushions and pulled the blanket Crowley had left him over his lap. It was incredibly soft, beige, and rimmed in charming little tassels. Best of all, Aziraphale knew Crowley hadn’t miracled it as he was completely out of juice after the day they’d had. He must have had it already, just in case.
He closed his eyes against the strange feeling of relief, or joy, or hope, fluttering with each beat of his earthly heart. He had never felt so free as he did now, on his own side with a demon. It felt right—it felt holy, even, loathe as Crowley would be to hear it.
If Aziraphale were honest, though he usually tried not to be, he felt truly adored.
There was no clock that Aziraphale could see in Crowley’s flat, but Aziraphale felt time slipping past his fingers. Another minute stolen from The Great Plan, from his superiors in Heaven who thought they were following the will of the Almighty. Surely She meant for this to happen. She must have, for time to continue to unspool before him, for Earth to continue to tumble around the Sun as it had for six millennia. He and Crowley had done the right thing after all.
If saving the world was the divine thing to do, it was also selfish. Heaven had been wrong, of course, but Aziraphale knew it wasn’t his certainty of God’s will that moved him. It hadn’t been devotion to Her. It was a selfish love of Earth and humanity and the free will he had always admired. Craved, even. And if tomorrow were to be his punishment for that defiance, then he might possibly deserve it.
But Aziraphale was tired, and confused, in a way he had never let himself feel. He defied Heaven and Hell, and helped the Antichrist do the same. A little, anyway. But he had done it, and he was still here. Still an angel. And Crowley, who had stood with him, was still a demon. Still his enemy, his co-conspirator, his friend, his opposite and his joy. They were still here, together, at least until tomorrow.
Aziraphale carefully folded the beige blanket, ignoring the way his hands shook. It might be their last evening, if their plan failed. He stood, and went to Crowley’s bedroom. He rapped gently at the door frame.
"Crowley?" he asked into the darkness.
"Hgh. Yes?" said the darkness. Crowley shot up from where he was sprawled across his bed. The doorway's light drew him in intimate, inky tones. His yellow eyes squinted bright under startled brows. A play in contrast.
“Crowley,” Aziraphale said, quieter. He was certain. He didn’t want to think. He wanted to feel like he wasn’t making a choice at all. He wanted to believe that the warm, caramel feeling in his chest was right and good and true, and he’d worry on it later, when it stuck in his teeth.
If anything, Crowley looked more startled at the soft tone. His exhaustion was almost a tangible air around him, despite the wary look in his tired eyes. His usually impeccable hair was sleep-tousled, a riotous crown about his head. Aziraphale had never seen him like this, Crowley would never have let him.
Aziraphale was pulled forward by the thought, by the sudden urge to smooth that short hair back and run his hands through the strands. Red like hellfire, but now soft and grayed in the light of the first evening that should never have been.
He was used to lying to himself, but he felt he couldn’t now. He might deserve punishment for wanting, but Aziraphale paid the thought no heed.
He climbed over the foot of the bed, afraid that any deviated path would evaporate his courage. As he moved forward, Crowley shoved back, knocking flat against the headboard with an audible rattling.
“Aziraphale! Aziraphale, what are you—?”
“I’m sorry for interrupting your sleep,” Aziraphale said, though he wasn’t particularly sorry. He had something to say. He pressed forward until his arms brushed Crowley’s satin pajamas. “I hope you know how thankful I am. For your staying, even when I was so cruel to you. Even when I was so obtuse as to believe that Heaven would listen to me about, well, any of this.”
Crowley, trapped between the bed and his arms, looked everywhere but at Aziraphale. “Don’t think anything of it. Don’t thank me, I don’t. I wasn’t really going to leave, not without—,” Crowley broke off. “You’re an angel, I know, I know. It’s fine.”
“It’s fine?” Aziraphale said, searching Crowley’s face. Crowley nodded slightly. “It’s not fine. Crowley, you’ve given me so much. So much patience and yes, kindness, don’t look at me like that.” Aziraphale took a deep breath. He closed his eyes. “You matter to me, more than you know.”
The silence that followed rang in Aziraphale’s ears. He opened his eyes. Crowley was looking at him, agape. He clicked his mouth shut, tried to form words but appeared to give up.
Aziraphale pushed forward again, so close he felt Crowley’s quick, unnecessary breaths against his cheek. He touched his hand to his sharp jaw, dragged gentle fingers to his chin.
“Would you give me one more kindness?” Aziraphale said. He pressed his thumb against Crowley’s bottom lip. “Forgive me?” he breathed.
Crowley made a complicated noise somewhere in this throat and surged up, slotting their lips together. He caught the tip of Aziraphale’s finger in his rush before Aziraphale slipped his arm around Crowley’s waist, balancing him. Crowley kissed almost furiously, his mouth pressing closed-mouthed and emphatic against his own, whispering yes and yes, always between each.
Aziraphale kissed him back just as fiercely, just as emphatically. His thighs burned with the effort of holding himself up above his lap, but he barely noticed. Crowley groped desperate hands at Aziraphale's neck, his shoulders, his curls as Aziraphale pressed him back against the headboard, firm enough that it might hurt someone with a less serpentine spine. As it was, Crowley made a breathless whine against his lips as Aziraphale bracketed his slim hips.
Aziraphale didn’t say love, didn’t even think of it, not in that moment. But he was so thankful and full of light with the sweet heat of Crowley pushing up against him and the warm caress of his tongue against his own that he felt very heavenly indeed, in the most human way possible.
In the morning, Crowley opened his eyes at the soft light slanting in from between his curtains. He blinked in surprise at Aziraphale staring right back at him, warmly, questioningly.
His eyes followed the arc of Azirphale’s shoulder to the dip where his plush hip disappeared beneath his sheets, an oil painting given life. He felt Aziraphale tracing shapes along his bare back.
“So not a dream then?” he said with humor, but something about it in this quiet light struck Aziraphale as terribly tragic.
“No.” Aziraphale dragged his hand back up Crowley’s spine to tickle at the hair at the base of his neck. Crowley’s eyes fluttered closed again, seemingly overwhelmed. He was unused to worship. “Not a dream at all.”
In the months following the events of the end of the world, very little was ended and something new began. The bookshop returned, the ducks continued to quack, and Crowley hovered around Aziraphale like a wise-cracking shadow, surprisingly jovial and always underfoot.
Aziraphale and Crowley had seen a lot of each other, ever since the eleven years before Warlock turned out to be the wrong boy. They saw even more of each other now, and Aziraphale was pleased.
"Dinner?" Crowley called as he slammed open the bookshop's door for the fifth consecutive day. The crisp November air whipped at his short hair.
The two customers milling about the entrance turned with a glare at his intrusion, which simply wouldn't do. Aziraphale shut his book and snapped. The customers shuffled out the door, which Crowley helpfully held open with a flutter of his hand.
When Crowley turned back around, Aziraphale was smiling openly at him. It had only been a few hours, but he had missed him. Crowley raised his eyebrows above his sunglasses. The bell above the door tinkled quietly. A slow smile began to stretch across his face.
They stood there, just grinning at each other. Aziraphale felt his heart soaring, rising up and up and filling the whole of him with a bone-deep warmth. He almost couldn't believe it, that he could feel this way without the dark ichor of fear that had dripped into every moment of their long history. Crowley was radiating love, not even trying to suppress it like he always had, and Aziraphale didn't ignore it like he always had.
"Dinner, angel?" Crowley asked, and meant I love you. It wasn't a choice at all when Aziraphale answered yes.
Aziraphale was a man of faith, though he was not strictly a man, and was, perhaps more strictly, of faith itself. It would be difficult to lack belief when God herself pulled you from nothing and whispered your name into your heavenly essence. He was faith, and indeed an angel couldn't lack faith, at least not in that sense.
While he disagreed with Heaven, it was more in attitude than on principle. It was clear to Aziraphale that the other angels were misled in the recent Apocalypse, but the plan was truly ineffable, after all. Even angels could mistake a job for ineffability. He certainly had. No, God loved the Earth, and the humans, and goodness, and so did Aziraphale.
It was clear, then, that Aziraphale could love earthly pleasures as much as the next being, and he always had. He had a reverence of God’s creation. But before there had always been a particular order to these things. There was God, and then the flutter of a yellowed page, the delicate texture of a mille feuille, and the rest.
There was little that pleased him more than Crowley. And now, maybe, that worried him.
"We're on our own side," Aziraphale said, still dizzy with their new freedom and a selection of the restaurant’s wine list.
"Said so all along." Crowley mocked, but he was smiling a little, glowing in the way he had been all through dinner and then dessert and then espresso.
Aziraphale thought about the image they made together at their white-clothed table, full of food and love. Gabriel would have been horrified, and Aziraphale found he didn’t care. Perhaps he should have been upset, should have felt abandoned by Heaven and his fellow angels. He didn't.
He had been so afraid. So afraid of losing everything he cared for. Finely aged wines, ancient books in need of a gentle hand, and stolen moments of time with his dearest enemy.
“You did,” agreed Aziraphale. He covered Crowley’s hand where it rested on the table and wove their fingers together. He squeezed, and Crowley squeezed back.
Aziraphale didn’t know if it was wrong, this feeling, but he knew how he felt. He would do anything to keep it.
The thought startled him. It was true and born of his affection for Crowley, but there was a possessive edge. It felt dangerous. Aziraphale sucked in a breath.
“What does it mean, do you think? To be on our own side?” Aziraphale asked, the spark of panic in his wine-addled brain urging him to speak.
Crowley frowned. “Whatever we want. It can be whatever you want.”
Decisions made Aziraphale nervous. He ignored the implicit question, and instead asked, “What do you want it to be?”
Crowley exhaled noisily, gestured vaguely with his free hand. “I want to enjoy it, alright? Without having to come up with clever reasons about why every choice is demonic. Maybe it’s evil or maybe it’s not, but it’s mine.” He paused for a moment, contemplative. “I’ll figure it out as I go.”
Aziraphale hummed, unsure. Crowley shifted their joined hands to run his thumb over the dips of Aziraphale’s knuckles, urging him on. When Aziraphale said nothing, Crowley sighed.
“It’s not just about me, angel.”
Aziraphale wished it were. It would be easier if he had guidance.
He had always believed in Heaven’s righteousness and in the truth of the work he was given to guide humanity. Yes, a fine appreciation for God’s creation was acceptable, and Aziraphale would always hold to that. His devotion to his life on Earth had been a reflection of his devotion to Heaven. Now, Aziraphale wasn’t so sure what it was, what it meant. Where there had always been an authority, there suddenly was not. What was an angel but the tool of an unknowable God?
There was nothing but himself, and all his raw desire.
Aziraphale was blindfolded, balancing on the invisible tightrope that was his angelic nature. Without his former conviction to Heaven’s cause, a misstep was unfathomable.
“How am I supposed to know?” he asked, forcing his voice steady. He fiddled with his empty espresso. The ceramic handle knocked into his spoon with a bright sound, sharp. The muted din of the restaurant continued, unaffected.
Crowley made another of his noises, this one indecisive. He released his hand to gesture at the room in a wide circle. Aziraphale instantly missed its reassuring grip.
“Have we ever really known? Has anyone? I know I never have,” Crowley said, not unkindly but with some bitterness. “Ineffable, right?”
He had misstepped somehow, as he feared. He watched as Crowley drained his glass and called for the check, tension wiring his shoulders taut beneath his dark jacket. None of Aziraphale’s worries were assuaged, and somehow he had upset Crowley.
Haltingly, Aziraphale fought past the uncertainty he felt. Crowley was too important to lose. “I do love you, you know. Very much, too much. It’s always you.” He was confused, but not about that.
Crowley relaxed minutely, but worry had taken root in the pinch of his brow. Aziraphale felt his nearly human heart skip like a damaged record. He wasn’t used to this look; it was one Crowley would have hidden in the past. He felt exposed, and quite certain he wouldn’t like to know why he felt that way.
“Reassuring, considering you’re stuck with me now. And you like it.” Crowley said eventually, a little wickedly.
He stood and held out Aziraphale’s coat. Aziraphale slid into it before turning in Crowley’s arms. He wrapped Crowley’s scarf gently around his throat for him. Kissed him once, gentle.
“As if I hadn’t all this time, serpent.”
Aziraphale pressed forward again to feel Crowley smile against his lips. A holy light in his chest flickered, a votive candle burning bright in a darkened cathedral.
Despite what some beings might say, given the chance, it was easy to love Crowley. He was funny, clever, and knew what Aziraphale wanted before he even asked for it.
“Wouldn’t it be easier to hoard your books if you didn’t try to sell them?” Crowley said one evening, tipped back onto wine-loose elbows and half melted into the likely uncomfortable jut of a bookshelf, not that it appeared to bother him at all. Just watching made Aziraphale settle more fully into his cushioned seat.
“I don’t hoard them. I collect them. Though it’s always a shame to lose one.” Aziraphale paused, selecting a cracker from the cheese board he didn’t quite remember putting together. He spread a bit of brie and a lavish swirl of the fig chutney. He closed his eyes to savor it with the single-minded focus of the truly drunk.
“You never did learn to share.” Crowley’s smile twitched. Aziraphale pursed his lips.
“Excuse me. Let’s not forget who gave humanity his own sword—”
“In the last few millennia, angel.”
Aziraphale stared back at him flatly and pointedly refilled Crowley’s abandoned wine glass. A little sloshed onto the antique tabletop, but another stain wouldn’t hurt it.
The gesture only served to make Crowley laugh brightly, uninhibited this deep into his cups. Something bubbly fizzed in the vicinity of Aziraphale’s chest, so it wasn’t all bad.
“Right, right. Truly magnanimous, you are.” Crowley slunk over to pick up his drink and dropped beside Aziraphale on his seatee. His legs spilled over Aziraphale’s lap.
“I’m an angel,” Aziraphale agreed, satisfied.
“That you are,” Crowley said, looping his arms around Aziraphale’s shoulders and kissing his cheek with a loud smack. “But one who likes his books. You can be a little selfish and keep them just for yourself, if you want to. Who’s going to tell you no, now?”
It was a beautiful thought, being allowed to keep his books without having to appear charitable about it. The bookshop, ultimately, was an excuse. A front for blending in, and to justify his ownership of so many mortal stories, his prized material possessions. Gabriel had never actually asked him why he kept his books—Aziraphale had just been afraid that he would, and then Heaven would know he was not quite as selfless as an angel should be.
It would be a small change. He rarely sold a book as it was. Aziraphale scrunched his nose against the drunken haze of his thoughts.
Tentatively, he wrapped his free arm, the one not holding a half-emptied (re-emptied? re-re-emptied?) bottle of red, around Crowley’s waist. Crowley, delighted, wiggled closer, practically in his lap now.
“I suppose you’re right, my dear.”
It certainly was tempting.
Crowley had found a cottage in the countryside, and was pretending as though he hadn’t for some time. Likewise, Aziraphale pretended that he didn’t notice the sudden interest in the size of his bookshelves or his preference for down comforters. Crowley got a particular devilish tilt to his smile when he felt he was being quite clever and mysterious, and Aziraphale couldn’t help but let him.
Crowley was not a terribly social creature, and had never much liked the messy sprawl of the city, Aziraphale knew. But it had been easier for his work. “It’s mass marketing,” he had said, as the two beings filed out after seeing a lovely opera at the Theater Royal’s opening in 1732. Crowley wrinkled his nose, which had charmed Aziraphale even then. “All those bodies packed together like sardines. Cities are a cesspool of low-grade evil.”
“And quite a lot of good,” Aziraphale had said offhand, still thinking of the opera, the decadent meal they had shared beforehand, and Crowley’s cheeky commentary throughout. Crowley had scoffed, and then walked with him through St. James before the sun set over the city.
Aziraphale loved London. It had all the best fine restaurants, by his estimation, but the company was finer still.
They were in Crowley’s Mayfair flat, at the bar in Crowley’s shiny black kitchen, when he finally brought it up.
It was January, and cold rain poured over London, which was a perfect excuse to laze about indoors. They were storeys above the constant cacophony of city life, made quiet with extensive soundproofing, as Crowley preferred. They had been discussing films they had seen in the last decade, and Crowley had given up when Aziraphale had only seen the few Crowley had shared with him, which mostly involved the spy flicks he fancied. The conversation lulled comfortably.
Aziraphale was tucking into a bit of toast as Crowley leaned forward on his spindly elbows, the island between them and still in his sleep-worn t-shirt. His eyes were uncovered and molten with morning light.
“Come with me,” Crowley said suddenly, seriously.
“To the cinema, or to your cottage?”
Crowley sputtered, as Aziraphale returned his toast to his plate and carefully dabbed at his lips with a napkin. Crowley might wait another moment in uncertainty. Aziraphale had been waiting for quite a while, after all. It was only fair.
“Nyk. How did you—? Hnn.”
“Well, you’re no James Bond, my dear.”
Crowley barked a laugh. “Bastard angel.”
He shook his head and took a fortifying, unnecessary breath. “If you know about it, well, just know that. That you don’t have to. It’s your choice, but. It’s got all your favorite things. Fireplace with those antique grates. About a thousand bookshelves, which is probably not enough, but all of your books and little knick-knacks will fit if the shelves know what’s good for them. A big, ugly armchair, just for you. A birdbath. A clawfoot tub.”
He paused as he tried to choke down how much he clearly wanted this, his voice dreamy and aching. There was fear written into the line of his throat and the nervous tap of his fingers on his thigh as he glanced away to the flat’s windows.
Crowley was defined by his doubt, a story told in questions and pushed boundaries. It didn’t mean it hurt less to know that Crowley doubted Aziraphale’s devotion even still. And that it was his fault, burning him with six thousand years of denial and misplaced faith.
Aziraphale hoped to mend Crowley’s broken trust in the next six thousand. He just had to prove himself worthy, devote himself entirely.
He let his reading glasses slip down his nose as he looked up at Crowley through his eyelashes. Let his love shine through.
“And you? You’ll be there?”
“Me too.” Crowley flushed, a brilliant pink that spread down his neck. Aziraphale felt quite accomplished.
“Then yes, dearest, I’ll move in with you.”
They didn’t bother much with packing. While Crowley and Aziraphale did appreciate doing things the human way, the hassle of physically moving house and home was too much. They were retired now, creatures of leisure, and Aziraphale really did have an incredible number of belongings.
The cottage was not small by modern standards, with four bedrooms, a study, a conservatory, and all the other requirements. It had plenty of rustic charm, with enough modern updates to please Crowley, once he had new heated flooring installed. They fought over curtains and upholstery for a few weeks before settling on neutrals with a few tartan accents. Crowley grumbled, but Aziraphale knew he truly didn’t mind. The beige blanket with tassels, from the first night of the rest of their lives, was draped over the sofa at his insistence.
The villages nearby had a few charming restaurants and little shops, not to mention a lovely seasonal farmer’s market. Brighton wasn’t too far beyond if they wanted more variety. The beach was just a short drive away, when the mood struck them. The waves were cold this time of year, but the beauty of the South Downs coastline and its chalky cliffs was worth the trip.
The newness of this life together with Crowley was exhilarating. There was a breathless excitement in experiencing new sides to his oldest enemy, his lover. He had always known Crowley’s many expressions, his favorite varieties of red wine, and his appreciation for indoor greenery that had developed in the 1970’s, but now there was also the way Crowley would rearrange furniture every few months, simply to try something new. There was his penchant for causing minor mayhem in the supermarket as a man knocked over a display of apples and his grin when chided for it. There was the novelty of his groggy morning routine, coffee before all else, and then a shower Aziraphale was often tempted into. Crowley smiled so much more, laughed without irony or fear.
It was idyllic. Aziraphale was restless.
He wanted to follow Crowley’s lead, to simply try to enjoy the world they had helped save. He wanted to savor the sweet scent of honeysuckle in Crowley’s garden and the gentle warmth of the flickering flames in the sitting room fireplace. He would have enjoyed these simple pleasures, before the Apocalypse.
God had not spoken to him directly in thousands of years, and likely wouldn’t. Aziraphale had to discover the rules for himself in this new, love-drenched life. The unfamiliarity of it brought him uncertainty even in its freedom, or rather because of it. A now familiar fear knotted painfully in his chest.
It helped to do the things he had always done. Things that had never gotten him into trouble in the past. He went into town, he ate good food, he completed crossword puzzles, and he read.
All of his books had managed to fit, just barely, into his and Crowley’s cottage, and he needn’t lose one to the ruinous hands of a customer again. It wasn’t a particularly angelic thought.
“Do you think I should open another bookshop here?” Aziraphale asked, dragging his finger along the full-to-bursting shelves in the study. No dust had accumulated yet, and his finger came away clean. It was a cold, quiet evening.
Crowley looked up from the records he was selecting between, sitting on the floor between neat piles. Not one of them had turned into Queen.
“Do you want to open a new shop?” he asked cautiously.
“Not really.”
“Then don’t,” Crowley said, as if it were simple. He selected a record and carried it over to the gramophone. “Sinatra, maybe?”
The record played, Crowley humming along absentmindedly. Aziraphale squeezed his shoulder, charmed, and moved to repair a book he had bought recently from an estate sale. It was familiar work that required his focus.
Sometime later, when he looked up again, the record had ended. Crowley hadn’t removed the needle, and the gramophone spilled static into the room. The grandfather clock in the back of the sitting room swung back and forth, its regular ticking out of rhythm with the nervous bounce of Crowley’s leg against the hardwood. The noise was grating.
Aziraphale glanced over to Crowley to ask him to turn it off, or at least put another on, only to find him staring back. Crowley was wearing his sunglasses, despite pouring himself into that chair quite some time prior. It all combined to give him the air of a caged animal, anxious and pacing.
“Give me your wings,” Crowley said. Aziraphale blinked. “I’m sure they’re a mess. When’s the last time you looked after them?”
“I’m not sure,” he admitted sheepishly. Crowley tsked at him, jerking out of his chair and then shoving his hands into his tight trouser pockets. He slouched toward the staircase, before turning back when he didn’t follow.
“Coming?” His face was carefully blank.
“Oh, yes, of course.” Aziraphale spurred his cowardly legs forward.
Upstairs, Crowley settled Aziraphale to face the head of their bed and slithered up behind him, tossing his glasses onto the side table. He helped him untuck his shirt and the cotton undershirt beneath as Aziraphale pulled them off and carefully placed them to the side.
Crowley ran the pads of his fingers down Aziraphale’s exposed back, past his shoulders where the phantom of his wings pressed against his muscles, and came to rest at his waist, a reverent touch.
“Let’s see the damage.”
Aziraphale let his wings unfurl into corporeality, the metallic tang of angelic essence sparking into their shared bedroom. Crowley sniffed, his demonic body a little sensitive to the energy. He shifted to wrap his lanky legs around Aziraphale. Knobby knees dug into Aziraphale’s ribs, but he didn’t mind.
“It’s not so bad.” Crowley combed through the primaries and secondaries loosely with his fingers, tidying. Aziraphale hummed, enjoying the simple touch. “Just a bit dusty, and uh, messy. When did you last have them out, did you say?”
“The last time was probably Armageddon, my dear. And I wasn’t exactly focused on their cleanliness at the time.”
Crowley made a noise of acknowledgement and they settled into a heavy silence. Aziraphale relaxed into the motion of hands carding through his wings, wincing slightly when Crowley tugged a few loose feathers free. He sighed quietly as Crowley moved to massage at his shoulder blades.
“You’re tense,” Crowley said, too neutrally. “It’s not been easy, yeah?”
Aziraphale sagged, pliant under Crowley’s hands and weak to his concern. The tips of his wings drooped just above the floor.
“I’m glad to have you,” he said. It wasn’t precisely a denial.
“I’m not sure that’s a good thing.” Crowley’s hands trembled where they were buried in Aziraphale’s feathers.
“What?” He nearly gasped.
“I’m a demon,” Crowley bit out, bitter even as his fingers still drew gently over Aziraphale, almost helplessly. “I’m made to taunt and tempt and turn all good things to sin. Even if I don’t mean to. If you’re glad to have me, you shouldn’t be.”
“Crowley, what are you saying—” Aziraphale tucked his wings close to his body and tried to turn around, but Crowley gripped his shoulders tight.
“Angel, I’m evil—No, shut up. Listen, I.” Crowley took in a lungful of air, pressed his forehead against Aziraphale’s neck. “I’m not an idiot. I tried to help, but I took too much. I can tell when you’re upset. How you’re so afraid to ask for what you want and how you won’t talk to me about it. I can’t blame you.
“I can tell you’re doubting. I can feel it, Aziraphale. It’s never been like this before we were together. You’ve never questioned Her this way, I would have known. You don’t belong to Heaven, but you belong to Her, and that’s how it should be!”
Aziraphale was frozen, his heart a violent, torn thing. Crowley hesitated. His next words were jagged like broken glass in his throat.
“I know you’re not mine. Not really. As much as I want it. You’re trying, and it’s hurting you. It’s my fault, angel,” he said, burying his head into Aziraphale’s plumage. Aziraphale, unable to turn around, grew pale. Crowley’s voice was wretched. “I’ve tempted you to doubt. I didn’t mean to. I love you, but I’m no good for you.” Crowley choked off, misery robbing him of speech.
And Aziraphale, for all the vulnerability between them, was angry. Completely livid and shaking with the force of it. He twisted in Crowley’s loosened hold, his wings tight against his back. Flushing red to his bare collarbones, Aziraphale shoved a pointed finger into Crowley’s chest.
“Are you asking me to choose?” Aziraphale spat.
Tremors racked his body. Wild emotions tumbled through him. He was coming to pieces.
Crowley gasped. He grabbed Aziraphale’s hand, circled his wrist as it pressed flat against him. Desperate. “No! Don’t. Go–Sat–Someone, angel, don’t.”
“Crowley, you’re an idiot if you think this is on you.”
His anger stoked fire in Crowley’s misery wet eyes. “Oh? And why ssshouldn’t I?” Crowley hissed. “It’s not fucking fun! I would know! Are you really willing to Fall? For this?” For me went unspoken, but Aziraphale heard.
“Am I supposed to be thankful that you’ve made yourself miserable over my fate? Don’t play a martyr, dear, it’s not flattering.”
“Fuck you!” Crowley jerked from the bed, taking half the sheets with him. He shook a tangled ankle free, cursing. He fisted at his hair, violent red. Every inch of him was sharp with fury. He turned to stare out the window, overlooking the garden of their countryside cottage.
“You’re a goddamn bastard, angel.”
Aziraphale deflated. This was ridiculous. Crowley was being ridiculous. It hurt. He was afraid. Aziraphale pulled on his shirt, the buttons slipping from his traitorous fingers. He snapped a miracle to fasten them. “Maybe I am,” he said, and made for the door.
“Where are you going?” Crowley asked warily.
“Somewhere I can make my own choices, Crowley.” Aziraphale left the room and walked downstairs in a daze.
“Aziraphale?” Crowley called from the top of the staircase. He looked very alone.
His heart hurt and his mind was buzzing. He couldn’t think clearly. He stepped outside, the winter chill cutting him deep. He took a breath, manifested his wings, and took flight.
Aziraphale stumbled his landing as his rarely used wings gave out, aching from even this short journey. The beach was blessedly empty on such a freezing night. Aziraphale had come here to think, at the edge of the island he had called home for over two hundred years.
The sting of salt on his cheeks and the whip of wind through his feathers was bracing. Primal. The cold cleared his mind, prevented the encroaching panic from taking hold in his heart. He kept moving.
Wings dragging along the pebbled coast behind him, Aziraphale walked the shore. His white feathers soaked dark with seawater. The rocks dug into his feet. He paid them no mind.
The Apocalypse had come and gone. And yet he was paralyzed by this fear of doing something unangelic, of not knowing where to step anymore without Heaven to draw his lines in the sand. He hated it.
It wasn’t Crowley’s fault. Crowley showed him there was an alternative to the degradation he’d endured under the heel of Heaven. He had always been that reprieve for Aziraphale. The only difference now was that Aziraphale didn’t have to pretend.
And yet he wasn’t happy, like he should be. He wasn’t free, not really. He was chained down even now by obligation, by the shoulds and should nots that no one could explain to him, no one but God. And She certainly hadn’t picked up the phone.
The cold terror of doubt cut through him, somewhere deep in his soul. Aziraphale gasped for breath, too panicked to realize he didn’t need to. Tears slipped messily down his face as he fell to his knees. He closed his burning eyes against the wind and the pain.
He loved Her, he did, but he didn’t know how to serve Her like this. He wasn’t sure what it meant to be an angel, not anymore.
The waves behind him crashed against the white cliffs, unflinching against the onslaught.
“Aziraphale!”
From behind him, Aziraphale heard the flap of panicked wings and a skitter of stones as Crowley landed hard on the shore.
“Angel, please!” Crowley shouted, scrabbling back to his feet and sprinting toward him.
“No, stop!” Aziraphale shouted. He didn’t look up. He heard Crowley stop running, but no one spoke. Icy water was soaking his trousers at his ankle. He could barely feel it. He opened his eyes.
Crowley was a short distance away, all dark wings and fearful desperation. His skin was impossibly pale, washed an unearthly white under the moonlight. His wide eyes were a glowing gold and so, so afraid.
Aziraphale had done that. His stomach twisted, and the darkness in his chest sliced icily against his heart. He gasped, and his wings fluttered uselessly behind him.
“Angel….”
Aziraphale choked on a laugh. “Am I?”
Crowley was silent for a moment. The waves rolled in.
“I’ve made a mess of things,” he said.
“Didn’t I tell you to stop blaming yourself for my sorry state, my dear?” Aziraphale said. He sighed and ran his hands down his chest, though nothing could smooth the wrinkles at this point, not even a miracle.
“What do you need, Aziraphale?” Crowley watched him, tense and visibly restraining himself from rushing forward. He reached his hand out, before jerking it back down to his side. Aziraphale wondered what Crowley saw, looking at him now. Was he that much of a mess? Did he need another rescue, this time from a prison more philosophical than the Bastille?
Something about Crowley’s outstretched hand had reminded Aziraphale of his hands in other times. A sheepish wave in Greece, when they found themselves invited to the same symposium. A wagging finger in a heated argument about Charles Darwin and the mystery of dinosaurs. The slight touch of their hands in passing over a case of prophecy books in a ruined church. His cool palms against his heated cheeks as they shared panted breaths. A gentle clasp of hands in the village market, pondering vegetables and lunch spots and the soft, improbable humanity of their lives.
And yet, here Aziraphale was, still terrified and angry and floundering as if it were over a hundred and fifty years earlier and their disagreement was about holy water rather than Aziraphale’s own holiness.
Crowley wanted to help, but Aziraphale had shut him out like he always did. And Crowley blamed it on himself for it. No, his doubts weren’t Crowley’s fault, though Aziraphale was still hurt. Ultimately, though drenched in self-hatred, it came from a place of love. And Aziraphale loved him dearly.
“You are the only thing I don’t doubt anymore,” Aziraphale said, his voice against the wind. The cruel terror lashed wildly within him, but he felt determination settle over his shoulders like a blanket. An acceptance. It was heavy, but it felt true.
“You know, I think you were right. I haven’t been entirely yours,” Aziraphale said reluctantly. He hated to lose an argument. “But it’s my own burden. My own choice, Crowley. I don’t know what it means to be an angel anymore. But I know what it means to have you. I’m not sure I want anything else.”
Crowley was the opposite of everything Aziraphale was meant to be, meant to understand. No good angel loved a demon as he did. Frankly, he didn’t care. He didn’t know what She wanted and would never know. He only had his past, his present, and his future. None of these would be worth anything without Crowley in it. If Aziraphale meant to adore Crowley completely, without question or denial, it would mean leaving behind everything, because of one simple truth.
An angel’s faith must be entire. His devotion must be plain. Absolute.
Aziraphale would love Crowley above God, a grave sin.
“Aziraphale. Angel. Oh God.” Crowley was babbling, panic pitching his voice. His knees crumpled under him where he stood barefoot on the pebbled beach.
Aziraphale saw the stricken look on Crowley's face, the alarm and love in his bright eyes, and stopped thinking. Aziraphale ran to him. For once he didn't think of God or of the angels so far away, deep in Heaven. He didn't even think of Earth, the gift for humanity that he had taken as his own, or of how he wanted more, even now.
He didn't think, and he felt a crumbling with each step, some chain unbinding his soul, an ancient wall tumbling around his heart and leaving a bright, scorching thing of hellfire and holiness, a fearless love. It licked through his veins, sharp and soft and cold and hot all at once. If this is demonic, then so be it, he thought, as the violent ocean against the shore roared in his ears. If this is angelic, then so be it. If this is just us, just us against it all, then I would be grateful.
Aziraphale’s wings snapped back behind him, brave and burning. A storm of feathers whipped into the air behind him and tumbled helplessly into the sea.
Aziraphale saw Crowley before him and remembered him stood against the doorframe of their new home, built with nails and boards and a sentiment so great neither occupant quite knew how to express it. Here under the looming white cliffs, Crowley looked fearful and hopeful, and Aziraphale understood.
Crowley opened his arms and Aziraphale tumbled into them, eyes closed, and that too was a leap of faith.
There was a heat consuming him from the inside out, a fire or a light or something else entirely. All that it left in its wake was his passion, his devotion to the being in his arms. Water worn stones dug into their knees and icy water soaked into the legs of their trousers. It gave Aziraphale something to focus on against the agony of loss and the overwhelming joy of freedom. He pulled Crowley into an embrace.
“Crowley, Crowley,” Aziraphale whispered against his cheek. “You are the only love I need.”
“Only me?” Crowley said, bewildered and clutching him so tightly.
“Yes, my darling, only you.”