Chapter Text
It was just a stupid fight.
Aziraphale shook his head, squinting through the gloom of late-night London as he struggled to insert his keys into the bookshop’s door.
It had started as a comment about a book he was reading, as many of their conversations do. Crowley seemed disinterested, lounging along the office sofa, scrolling on that infernal device, but he made a non-committal noise nonetheless to let the angel know he had heard him.
Aziraphale had then delved headfirst into a rather one-sided analysis of his latest read, prattling excitedly about the main characters, their relationships and the moral quandaries they had faced so far. Crowley, all the while, remained quiet, inserting the odd “uh-huh” and “right, Angel” at appropriate enough times to let Aziraphale know he was listening just a little closer than he was trying to let on.
And then Aziraphale had said something that had piqued the demon’s interest.
He couldn’t even remember what it was. Something about flowers? Or the seasons? Who knows. But one tangent had led to another, and suddenly there were raised voices and flailing hands, and before he knew what was happening, Crowley was storming out in a huff, slamming the door behind him.
It seemed to be happening more frequently these days. The tiffs. But then, they’d never been able to spend this much time together. What used to be centuries of separation had now become hours, days at most. Perhaps Aziraphale’s constant need to share his interests was starting to wear on the demon.
The angel sighed heavily, placing a palm against the door to steady himself as he leant down to retrieve his dropped keys for the second time in as many minutes. As he came to his feet, he flicked his fingers at the lock, hearing a satisfying click, and pushed his way through into the warmth of his bookshop.
It was quiet, and dark. He had forgotten to leave a light on before going out. But as he shuffled blindly forward, his desk lamp burst to life, beating back the shadows. And there, sitting in his antique office chair, was Crowley - positioned towards the door, fingers splayed out over the ends of the armrests like spiders, long legs crossed - waiting in the dark like some comic book villain.
He was back. The angel could always count on Crowley to come back.
Aziraphale stilled in the main entranceway, the sharp tinkle of the overhead doorbell still hanging in the air despite having quieted a good 15 seconds previously.
“You’ve been out,” Crowley said lowly from his perch.
The comment made Aziraphale bristle. Like he had been caught misbehaving.
“Yes, well, I am allowed to leave my shop when I so desire, Crowley. I don’t need your permission to do that,” he responded tersely, straightening himself to try to hide the wobble in his step as he descended the entranceway stairs.
He couldn’t even remember what they had fought about, so why was he being so defensive?
“You’re drunk.” Crowley commented, frowning slightly, a hint of surprise in his voice as he took in the angel’s rosy cheeks and mild sway as he moved across the room.
Aziraphale avoided eye contact.
So maybe he was.
So maybe, after Crowley had stormed out, the angel had felt so terrible he hadn’t been able to go back to his book. So maybe he had left the store to look for Crowley, only managing to work himself up further over the ridiculousness of it all. And maybe, as the sun dropped below the horizon and the street lights bloomed in the darkness, he had found himself outside a random pub and decided he needed a drink, or five.
“Again, that is not something I need your permission for, Crowley.” He shrugged his coat off his shoulders, pausing for a moment as he noticed the demon’s already hanging on the coat stand, before settling his own down on the hook beside it.
“You never get drunk without-“ Crowley cut himself off, but Aziraphale knew what was meant to follow. Me. You never get drunk without me. He sounded disappointed.
Neither of them spoke.
It was true. Every time Aziraphale had overindulged, Crowley was usually involved. But it had never been due to unpleasantness. Always a result of the two of them losing track of consumption and time while they enjoyed each other’s company.
Why was this situation so different? They’d had disagreements before. Why, this time, did he struggle to let it go? Not the argument itself, that was nonsense. But rather, the feeling it invoked.
He twisted at his signet ring.
“S’ long time to be drinking alone,” Crowley said after a long pause, feigning indifference.
Aziraphale glanced at the clock on his desk over the demon’s shoulder. It was quite late. After 1 o’clock in the morning.
“I wasn’t alone,” Aziraphale retorted. He didn’t know why he felt the need to divulge this information, but the speed at which Crowley’s head snapped up felt oddly satisfying.
“No,” the angel continued, if not a little smugly, emboldened. “I met a lovely gentleman at the establishment who was quite happy to keep me company.”
“Who?” Crowley asked, the chair creaking loudly as the demon shifted.
Aziraphale kept his distance, turning back towards the bookcase behind him, as he pretended to examine the spines on the shelf, taking his time.
“Jonah? Jacob, maybe? It started with a ‘J’…”
Liar.
Crowley snorted loudly and the chair creaked again as he settled back against the cushions.
“Real memorable chap, then.”
“Oh, he was a very good listener, and impressively knowledgeable. We talked for hours over Dickens and Austen and–“
“-Right. Trust you to manage to find the only other bookworm in the Pub.” The bitterness in Crowley’s voice was unmistakable, and Aziraphale turned back to find him sunk further into the chair, his arms crossed, scowling at a singular point on the floor.
“You wouldn’t have picked it!” the angel pressed on, unapologetically, rolling his shirt sleeves up for the sake of having something to do with his hands. Or perhaps it was just his subconscious preparing for another fight. “Quite the rugged-looking fellow - more lumberjack than literature. He had a lovely laugh though. And he was kind enough to pay for all the drinks.”
“M’ sure he was…” Crowley grumbled at the floorboards like they had personally offended him. The corner Crowley was sitting in suddenly felt a little darker, despite the desk lamp being right next to him.
Aziraphale knew he should stop. He could see Crowley’s annoyance bubbling away. But every micro-action, a hunch of shoulders, a twitch in the demon’s jaw, only seemed to fuel his drunken pettiness.
And maybe, just maybe… he liked it a little.
Another long silence. Finally, Crowley sat up a little straighter, realisation flicking across his features.
“Pub would have closed a while ago. Where have you been?”
The feeling of smug gratification the angel had been harbouring in his chest suddenly turned to lead, and dropped into his stomach like a cannonball. He looked away, back towards the books.
The shelves really needed a good dusting.
“We- we hadn’t finished our discussion on Shakespeare, so he invited me back to his flat for tea.”
Another creak of the chair. Less satisfying, more mortifying.
“Tea?”
“Tea.” Aziraphale could feel the heat rising in his cheeks, a flush that had nothing to do with the alcohol in his system.
“Tea.” Crowley repeated. “After midnight?”
The angel swallowed.
“Yes… well I realise now that ‘tea’ didn’t actually mean ‘tea’.” Oh Lord. Why were they saying tea so much?
The ball in his stomach turned from embarrassment to guilt.
Because maybe Aziraphale had suspected that it wasn’t ‘tea’ when the offer was first voiced on the pavement outside the pub, as the last patrons shuffled their way back home. And maybe his companion wasn’t actually a lumberjack, but rather a tall, slender man with dark hair and sharp wit whose name didn’t start with a J. And maybe, with the help of a lot of alcohol, he’d become a little lost in it all.
Maybe, he just wanted to see… what it would be like if-
“What happened, Aziraphale?” Crowley’s voice appeared just over his shoulder and the angel spun with a start, finding the demon directly in front of him. His face was dark, his stare intense. “Did he hurt you?” His eyes darted across the angel’s face, down to his exposed forearms and back up again, searching for signs of damage.
Aziraphale almost melted. The thought that Crowley was ready to go to war for him. The realisation the demon was more concerned for his wellbeing than at being angry with him.
“Oh, Crowley. No. It wasn’t like that.” He looked down, twisting nervously at his ring, fighting back the sadness and shame. “It was… nice.”
Because it was nice… while he was able to pretend.
The demon seemed to stiffen at the word ‘nice’, but he didn’t move away. Aziraphale wanted to sink back into the bookcase, disappear amongst the countless spines where those yellow eyes couldn’t follow. Only a few minutes ago he was basking in the self-satisfaction of making Crowley uncomfortable. Now it was his turn.
“What did he do?”
Aziraphale blinked, the question catching him off-guard. He had expected Crowley to rage, or sneer. Make some scathing remark at the angel’s expense over how foolishly innocent and trusting he was. Not-
He blushed violently, trying to look anywhere but Crowley’s face as the demon waited uncharacteristically patiently for an answer.
“He- Well, he touched my arm,” he said quietly, glancing to his right.
The demon followed his gaze, then slowly reached out and put his hand around the angel’s forearm.
“Here?” he said, looking back up at Aziraphale for confirmation. His stomach did a small flip. Crowley’s skin felt cool to the touch, but his own seemed to burn underneath it.
“Umm- it- no,” he stammered, somehow mustering the courage to reach out and take the demon’s wrist, repositioning it at the top of his bicep. “There.”
Crowley paused for a moment, staring at his own hand, his face unreadably passive, before dragging his eyes back to meet the angel’s.
“And then?” he prompted. Aziraphale felt suddenly, dangerously dizzy, his mouth dry.
“He- he put his other hand… here,” his voice going up half an octave as he gently brushed the fingers of his left hand against the side of his neck, watching Crowley’s slitted pupils follow the movement.
Aziraphale had barely removed his hand before Crowley was reaching up, sliding his own in place.
“Like this?”
Crowley’s voice had dropped deeper, enough to send a vibration down the angel’s spine that settled somewhere deep in his belly. His thumb rested against the fragile pulse at Aziraphale’s throat, not pressing or threatening. Simply there.
Surely, he could feel it - the frantic hammering beneath skin, the gooseflesh erupting over the back of his neck. The traitorously human reactions to his touch the angel had no control over.
Aziraphale swallowed and he felt the demon’s thumb shift, tracing a line down and back up the column of his neck, delicate and light as a feather.
He had faced down Hell’s council. He had stood before the Metatron and Archangels. He had lied to both above and below. Weathered it all. And yet this, this proximity, was unravelling him at the seams.
He nodded.
“Yes,” he said, though it came out softer than intended. Breathier.
Crowley stepped closer.
It was barely a shift. A subtle adjustment of weight, the glide of a polished shoe across dusty floorboards. The space between them narrowed to warmth and breath and the faint, familiar scent of old books and expensive cologne.
Whether through instinct or pure longing, Aziraphale leaned forward into the heat without thinking. Like a moth drawn to a flame, despite the danger of being burnt.
Why did it ache so much to have him this close after all this time? Why did it feel like that first moment he had tasted human food all over again? When he had never truly realised just how hungry he was.
“And you?” Crowley continued, his voice rougher. Scraped thin. “What did you do?”
Aziraphale inhaled sharply, turning his head slightly, his nose brushing against Crowley’s cheek. The demon was no longer looking at him, but past him, through the curls over his left ear into the books behind him.
He could hear it clearly now. The strain in his voice, the pain it was struggling to mask. It all became so obvious once he gave it a name.
Defensiveness.
Protectiveness.
An agonizingly direct need for details.
Jealously. Crowley was jealous.
And it tore at him to realise how much he had stoked that fire, the hurt Crowley was inflicting upon himself in dragging them through this reenactment. A reenactment that far exceeded the pale imitation it was based upon, in Aziraphale’s opinion.
The angel’s hands hovered for the briefest moment, before settling tentatively either side of Crowley’s waist.
Aziraphale felt it as Crowley pressed their temples together. A twitch in his jaw, a grind of teeth. A steady, controlled breath in and out as his eyes fluttered shut. Five seconds of stillness before he moved again.
He was on Aziraphale’s other side now, nose and lips tracing a line along the angel’s jaw until he reached the shell of his ear. How he managed to make out anything over the pounding of blood against his eardrum was a miracle in itself, but when Crowley spoke next, he heard every whispered syllable, every crack in his voice and click of his tongue.
“And what came next, An- Aziraphale?” he asked, catching the pet name before it completely slipped out. “Did you let him kiss you?” A pause. “Taste you?”
Every word was a hot brush on skin. Oh Lord, this had to be a temptation. Crowley had to be using some kind of demonic power because the effect he was having was otherworldly. Unnatural. It felt like the air had been sucked out of the room. Like gravity was playing games with him.
“Did he touch you in the most intimate of places?”
Crowley’s hand lifted off his bicep and Aziraphale thought he might just discorporate on the spot. But then a second later it settled back in place, if only to grip a little tighter. The desk lamp buzzed and flickered for a moment.
“Did you moan his name in the dark?”
Aziraphale squeezed his eyes shut and bit down on the inside of his cheek.
Crowley’s onslaught was relentless. This wasn’t drunken fumbling in some stranger’s apartment. Yes, the angel could still feel the alcohol in his system, but they were both well and truly in control of their faculties.
This was slow.
Measured.
Deliberate.
And Crowley was driving the narrative far more than Aziraphale was at this point.
Say yes! His mind screamed. Just say yes and see how far Crowley was willing to push this.
But that would be lying and selfishly taking advantage. He couldn’t do that. Not to Crowley.
Tears burned behind his eyelids.
He bit down harder, dug his fingers into Crowley’s sides as he heard the demon take in another breath. The desk lamp suddenly clicked off, swallowing the room in shadow.
“Say the name, Angel…” he whispered.
“Crowley.” It was a whine and a plead and a prayer all at once.
But it may as well have been a magic spell because the moment it slipped from his lips, the demon turned to stone. He stopped breathing, every muscle tensing in unison as he froze in place, and the lamp flickered back to life.
Silence stretched out, achingly long, and then-
“Wrong name,” he mumbled.
“No, it isn’t,” Aziraphale responded quickly, adamant, never so sure of anything in his entire existence.
Crowley pulled back, his eyes wide, hands dropping away. Aziraphale held on tight, refusing to let him retreat beyond arm’s length.
“You said my name.” He was frowning. Confused. Was it really so hard to believe?
“I did.”
Crowley’s eyes were darting around the room as if looking for an escape. His breathing had quickened and he subconsciously reached up toward his own face, feeling for his glasses that weren’t there. He seemed scared. Like a sleepwalker waking to find themselves in a very different place to where they went to sleep.
“I’m not-“ he stopped, and then tried again. “I’m not… nice,” he said finally, looking back at Aziraphale. It wasn’t a sneer or sarcastic deflection. Just a raw confession. Factual.
Aziraphale smiled weakly.
“Oh, Crowley,” he murmured. “I don’t want nice.”
He wanted sharp edges and clever retorts. He wanted arguments that lasted centuries and comfortable silences that said more than Heaven ever had. He wanted the demon who had stood beside him at the very beginning and never quite stepped away.
Crowley stared at him, waiting.
For the joke. The retraction. The inevitable ‘but’ or ‘though’ or ‘however’…
It didn’t come. Instead, Aziraphale pulled gently at his waist, drawing him back in.
The demon resisted for a heartbeat. Not physically, but just in the way his body held taut, as if bracing for impact. As though any movement might shatter something fragile and irretrievable between them.
Aziraphale could see it. The uncertainty. The possibility that this was a mistake. That Aziraphale was drunk and the light of tomorrow would bring nothing but regret wrapped in heavenly politeness. Another interaction to be swept under the rug, steadfastly ignored and never discussed.
“He looked like you, in the dark,” he said softly, his hands fisting in the demon’s shirt out of fear he might run.
The devastatingly shameful truth.
Crowley’s throat bobbed.
“I let him, because I thought, that maybe-“ he paused, blinking hard, gathering himself, “-if -if it just felt a fraction like-”
“-Like what?” Crowley asked, sliding forward a little more.
“Like this,” he answered honestly, closing the remaining distance between them. “I said your name.” He let out a small, disbelieving laugh. “Not his. Yours. And it brought to my attention something that should have been painstakingly obvious from the start.”
Crowley stayed quiet, but one hand had found it’s way back to Aziraphale’s bicep.
“A drop of rain would never fill an ocean.”
Crowley made a small, broken sound. The kind one makes when something long-buried finally surfaces. He closed his eyes and pressed their foreheads together.
“You don’t get to do that,” he murmured hoarsely. “You don’t get to be all poetic and expect me to-“
“To what?”
“To believe you,” he finished.
The admission hung in the air. Aziraphale’s heart ached with the nakedness of it.
“I’m not-“ he began again, unable to fight the compulsion to protest.
“-You are!” Aziraphale cut across him, his voice finding strength. “You are Everything. You always have been. I was just too much of a coward to say it.”
Crowley didn’t respond. Rather he just stood in place, quietly contemplating the angel’s confession. And Aziraphale let him. Whether it was seconds or minutes or hours that passed, he wasn’t sure, but Aziraphale stayed put, held tight, and waited.
He was almost caught by surprise when he felt the demon’s hand cradle his jaw again. Felt long fingers slide into his hair and pull gently to tilt his head before those warm lips that had teased at his neck finally made contact with his own.
It was fleeting, barely lasting a breath.
But Aziraphale leaned into it.
And everything changed.
Crowley inhaled sharply against him, like a man surfacing from deep water. He pushed forward, sending them both stumbling back into the bookcase. The impact caused the entire shelf to rock ominously, sending countless books careening off the opposite side to the floor below.
Crowley, in an impressive show of agility and awareness, reached out and grabbed the shelf with one hand, never breaking contact with the angel, anchoring all three of them at once.
In another life, another universe, Aziraphale may have been perturbed by the mess. Annoyed at the thought of having to reorganise his collection.
But the shelves needed a good dusting, anyway.
He laughed softly against Crowley’s mouth.
“What?” he said, breaking away, looking slightly concerned and out of breath, one hand still gripping the bookshelf for safety.
“Nothing. Absolutely nothing,” Aziraphale laughed, unable to contain his happiness.
“You’re still drunk,” Crowley frowned, a little indignant. Aziraphale smiled.
“Hmm, perhaps, just a little.” He brought their foreheads back together, inhaling slowly, basking in Crowley’s scent and warmth. “You know what might help?” he asked finally.
“What?”
“Some tea,” he answered, putting extreme emphasis on the last word.
Crowley ever so slowly pulled back, searching the angel’s face. The edge of Aziraphale’s mouth twitched.
“Tea?”
“Tea,” Aziraphale repeated pointedly.
Crowley straightened, cleared his throat. He still hadn’t let go of the bookshelf and the angel wondered if that was more for his own stability now.
“That sounds…” Crowley hesitated, something akin to fondness flickering across his face. “… nice.”