Chapter Text
“I want this one,” a spindly finger tapped decidedly at a picture of an old cottage, expertly photographed in a way that made the rust-colour of the old brick stand out against the green of the wildflower garden, the ancient glass of a greenhouse foggy and glistening in the shy, golden sunlight. Crowley pushed the printed paper across the irregular surface of the angel’s wooden kitchen table with a hum, reclining back into his chair with a creak, crossing his arms loosely over his chest.
“Let me see, darling,” Aziraphale adjusted the rounded spectacles at the tip of his upturned nose, and picked up the pages from the table, pushing them slightly away from his face as though reading it up-close was a struggle. “Oh, my. I must say, the bay window has certainly caught my eye,” he continued, carding through the papers.
“Yeah. It’s got a conservatory, too. For plants." Crowley commented off-handedly, and perhaps nonchalant to anyone who didn’t know him as keenly as Aziraphale did.
But after six millennia of shared words, of fondness harboured in secret, of riffling through him like he was the most precious book of all, had Aziraphale knowing each wrinkle, each micro-expression better than he knew the curves of his own body, and he knew just how much that greenhouse had enthused Crowley beyond words.
And if Aziraphale were to be honest, the idea of him in a gardening apron, sleeves elegantly rolled up to bare freckled forearms, the smell of earth and flowers on him, was a welcome one indeed.
“I see that,” Aziraphale said, pressing his lips together to disguise the smile that threatened to tug at the edges of his mouth.
Crowley bounced his leg, attempting to channel his nervous energy instead of letting it bite at the bottom of his lungs, reaching for his coffee cup that stayed miraculously steaming against the cool kitchen air all the while the pair inspected the several listings for old homes in the South Downs hills of south-eastern England, and Aziraphale nursed a generous slice of Victoria sponge he had baked the previous evening.
It was nothing short of divine, even if Aziraphale had tutted his tongue and said something about blasphemy when Crowley had let the word slip his grasp while embraced by the angel’s cream sheets and the warmth radiating off his stout body as he read an old book just inches away, when tiredness descended upon him like a blanket, and the bliss of this new life seeped into his bones. Life like this, as a pair, as a couple, seemed much like a dream, like a fantasy Crowley had let become too realistic in the dark sternness of his flat, when his chest hurt and his heart beating felt more like a reminder of his loneliness than a connecting string to his humanity. And every day, Crowley wondered if it would all crumble around him, if this had been a mirage concocted by a lovesick mind so wretched, and the curtain would collapse to reveal the hordes of Hell pointing and laughing, their rotting smell tainting the precious beauty of his desires.
But now, they were picking a house together. A home.
Not that the bookshop wasn’t home — a blessed, clean corner of the world that Hell could not infect, where the leather of the sofa knew the angles and points of Crowley’s corporation, where the air smelled of parchment and dust and something that just reminded him of Aziraphale. But it was so excruciatingly aziraphalean that there was little space for anything that represented Crowley; it was a place created to reflect and comfort the angel, a place where the air moulded perfectly to the plushness of his silhouette, the physical embodiment of everything he enjoyed about Earth and who he fundamentally was.
And Crowley loved nothing more than Aziraphale, but the prospect of having a home that he too could contribute to, a home they could decorate together, where every corner was cleansed of their previous lives, left his heart thumping at his ribcage with excitement.
“So, what do you think?” Crowley broke the silence after a loud slurp of his brew.
Aziraphale placed the papers down on the table calmly, removing his spectacles carefully and offering Crowley a gentle smile.
“It think it’s perfect, my dear boy.”
~
In person, the house was far more darling than in the many printed pictures Crowley had offered, after a particularly frustrating evening when he’d tried to get Aziraphale to enjoy them on the screen of his smartphone, only to be told repeatedly that photographs are meant to be paper, dear, not just bits and bobs on a shiny screen, all the while being exceedingly good at missing the place he intended on tapping and unwittingly changing the window with an irritated huff.
Two chimneys sprouted from the angled roof, dark brown shingles occasionally dotted with foliage, brick-orange and dashing against the powder blue of the morning sky, exhaling whitish smoke into the Heavens as the fireplaces in the living area and the bedchamber warmed the atmosphere and left behind a scent that could only be described as homely. A white-flowered bougainvillea grew lush against the brick of the front wall, framing a pale-green door and making the brass hardware stand out even more, glistening against the sun rays like liquid gold, occasionally dropping pale petals like snowflakes in mid-December.
The sound of the Bentley doors slamming shut startled a couple of black-birds that chirped indignantly as they flew away from the ancient, English oak that must have seen centuries roll by as it watched over the expanse of the yard and all the critters that called it home, a venerable guardian that imposed great respect. Aziraphale stood by the wrought-iron gate with its peeling, dark green paint, hand on his chest and not daring to cross the threshold with the sheer disbelief of his new reality.
“It’s bloody gorgeous out here,” Crowley commented with more excitement in his voice than he endeavoured to show, instantly pushing the old gate open with a long arm, ignoring its whined cry and taking a few steps into the property before realising the angel wasn’t following.
He looked over his shoulder, noting a decidedly frozen Aziraphale who simply gawked at the house ahead.
“Did you suddenly turn into a vampire and need an invitation to come in or something?”
Aziraphale’s expression instantly changed to a familiar sort of mix between irritation and fondness as he snapped out of whatever thought consumed him, giving Crowley a scolding glance before following him into what now was their space. Crowley offered a mischievous, self-satisfied grin, before quickly climbing the pair of steps that led to that quaint little front door with languid hops, opening it in earnest to take a gander indoors.
Aziraphale was much less hasty in coming inside, his heart fluttering in his chest in a way it hardly ever had before, safe for when Crowley’s lips had crashed into his in a desperate attempt to show him just what he had failed to see for thousands of years, just shy of two months prior. The birdsong was a magnificent symphony, a respite from the wail of cars at all hours in Soho; it had the angel stopping to close his eyes and take a deep breath, as he often had when the gramophone belted marvellous compositions by long-gone savants back in the claustrophobic comfort of the bookshop, the fine scent of the countryside and wildflowers an enchanting contrast to the smell of exhaust and rubbish. He finally stepped inside, taking in every flaw of the cottage that gave her all the character he realised he was growing ever so fond of, dashes of black blurring into the periphery of his vision as Crowley ran about, checking every corner and doing a scrutinising inspection of the place.
“Crowley, I fear you will wear down the floorboards before we even get the chance to get some furniture in here,”
Crowley looked back, lifting his eyebrows from behind the rims of his dark glasses and pulling up his lip in a scowl.
“I can miracle us some furniture, if it makes you fuss over the floor any less.” Crowley said as he now rubbed his palms gently over the wooden counters of the kitchen, Aziraphale having followed calmly and watching him from the doorway.
“I rather think we could pop into town and see what they have to offer. Perhaps they have a café, or who knows, a patisserie, and we can grab ourselves a nibble.”