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The first winter after the world didn’t end, it snowed in London.
Any square-tiled roof that hadn’t seen a clean raindrop since before the Great Smog was now blanketed in a white layer, fluffy and plump. The streets were, of course, desecrated by filth as the snow came down, but there was a tidy line of white at the edges of the road, which was where Aziraphale walked, heel-to-toe, enjoying each sudden dent his weight put in the untarnished, crisp snow.
Crowley accompanied him, half-numb hands deep in the pockets of his buttonless black overcoat, his steps lingering along the pavement, waiting for Aziraphale to catch up. His breath clouded out, turned gold by the late-night lights from nearby shops, a gold almost as bright as his eyes behind those fogged-up sunglasses of his.
“Disarmageddon!” Crowley exclaimed, apropos of nothing.
“I’m sorry?” Aziraphale said, alarmed, stepped back onto the pavement before a Lexus could spray him with slush.
“That’s what we should call it.”
“I thought we were calling it The Apocalypse That Never Came To Be.”
“You were friends with Shakespeare,” Crowley said somewhat accusingly, as they ambled along side-by-side, elbows bumping. “Brevity is the soul of wit, is it not?”
“Well, I suppose.”
“Disarmageddon,” Crowley said again.
Aziraphale gave a long-suffering but faintly amused sigh. “Speaking of things that were meant to be but never came to pass – I thought we were going to get drinks.”
“Oh. Yeah. Next left.”
“Not the Ritz? Not that dainty little tea shop with the thick fruit cake and the butter that’s just the right temperature to spread—”
“Coffee, angel, I need coffee. If we’re really doing this thing, no miracles, living as people, then we’re damn well going to do as people do in winter: drench our bodies in scalding-hot caffeine and set ourselves on fire to keep warm.”
“I rather hope not. Not that last part, at least.”
Crowley smiled a little. “They have a fireplace. We could sit near it.”
“To be quite frank, being this cold, I’d almost consider sitting inside it.”
“Been there, done that,” Crowley uttered, guiding Aziraphale around the corner and towards the coffee shop. “If the t-shirt came in black I might’ve bought it.”
Aziraphale stopped before the cafe, letting out a content, “Ah.” He began loosening his faun-coloured gloves, using them to swipe snow flecks from the lapel of his camel-hair coat. “Well then. Looks inviting. Come on!”
He went up to the door, about to open it for Crowley, when Crowley opened it for him.
“My treat,” Crowley purred, gesturing Aziraphale inside.
“Oh,” Aziraphale said, with a flattered smile, still looking at Crowley as he entered behind him, door easing shut. “How kind.”
It was pleasantly toasty inside. The scent of roasting coffee beans played melodies in the air, a veritable symphony of aroma. The faint tings and clacks of teaspoons and saucers punctuated a jumble of low voices, making up a backdrop of brown brick and brown noise, wholesome and warm on the senses.
“This cafe must be new,” Aziraphale said. When Crowley shrugged his lower lip up, head cocked, Aziraphale replied, “Do you mean to tell me this has been here in Soho for years and I never realised?”
“You weren’t looking for coffee,” Crowley said, taking his own black leather gloves off, fingers splayed, stretching them once they were free. He stepped up to the customer’s line, where he and Aziraphale stood behind an Indian couple, who were pointing at the menu board and discussing their order with the barista.
“Coffee aside, they have an impressive selection of cakes,” Aziraphale marvelled, looking in delight over the well-lit four-level display behind a curved glass divider. “Dear me, I’ll never choose.”
Crowley put his bare hands in his coat pockets, gazing at the selection, then at Aziraphale, smiling.
By the time the barista was free to take their order, Aziraphale was still prattling on about whether to have chocolate cake, which he knew he always liked, regardless of origin or quality, or to try a flaky baklava, which he’d loved in Turkey but he couldn’t be sure whether two thousand years and four thousand miles would have rendered it a different foodstuff entirely.
Crowley hooked an elbow over the glass divider and drawled to the barista, “Average-sized cup of coffee, the blackest, bitterest thing you have. Add extra black and bitter. And— And... Um – a... a sugar. Please,” he added, shamefaced. “Just one! Plus a slice of Jamaican ginger cake. Do you do that with butter? Yeah. I’ll take butter.”
The barista nodded. “Nnnnnyup, got that. Anything else?”
“Nope, that’s all for me. Angel?” Crowley touched his fingertips to Aziraphale’s elbow, feeling his warmth through his shirt, as he’d taken off his coat, draping it over his arms.
“Alright, my dear, I’m still deciding,” Aziraphale uttered crossly. “Don’t rush me!”
Crowley gave the barista a quick smile. “Doesn’t like to be rushed,” he murmured, making the barista grin, tucking her curly black hair behind her ear. She waited a while, then her eyes drifted, and she began stacking white cups, then returned to the counter. Realising Aziraphale was going to take some time, she suggested to Crowley, “Why don’t I ring you up now, and your friend can pay for his order once he’s sorted.”
“Oh— No-no, we’re together,” Crowley said, waving a finger between himself and Aziraphale. “I’m paying.” He shrugged a shoulder, wearing a comfortable smile. “I don’t mind waiting.”
The barista glanced nervously to the customers who’d just come in.
Crowley sighed, eyebrows rising, then sinking. He toyed with the idea of holding up the line, and the idea gave him a thrill, but he knew, deep down, if he was going to annoy people, he’d rather they not blame him for their annoyance. And he certainly wouldn’t want them to think badly of Aziraphale. He’d rather irritate from a respectable distance. “Go ahead,” he said to the barista, tilting his head towards the newcomers. “We’ll still be here. Ten minutes. Next week. Next year. Next damn century.”
The barista restrained a laugh, quickly moving to serve the other customers.
“You could just get both, you know,” Crowley said to Aziraphale, prowling around his back, then standing on his left, out of the way of the other people. “One dessert, two desserts, what’s the difference?”
“That is a good point,” Aziraphale said ponderously. He cast a quick look towards Crowley. “You needn’t wait for me, Crowley, not if you’re craving coffee all that badly.”
Crowley shrugged, shoulder rising, hands going deeper into his pockets. “I’ve craved worse.” Less than a minute later, he added, “Oop, come on. Queue’s opening up.”
As the other customers went to find seats, and a second barista prepared their order, the girl at the counter offered a warm smile, bright-eyed, as Crowley snuck back towards her.
“Medium coffee,” the barista remembered, punching Crowley’s order into her machine again. “Black, with an extra shot and one sugar. Ginger cake with butter. And has your husband decided?”
Husband.
It went very quiet and very still in the cafe for a moment. Crowley felt chills down his spine as heat erupted in his belly. Aziraphale lost his breath to a pleasurable shudder and nearly dropped his coat.
“Ahh—” Aziraphale stared at the barista. “Ah, yes, yes, um. Um, let’s see. Let’s see.” He looked frantically at the cake selection, unable to process what he was seeing, or remember what he’d decided.
“He’ll have coffee,” Crowley breathed. “Sss-something. Milky. Fluffy. White and sweet. Biggest you have.”
“Oh, yes. Cappuccino? No, wait! Mocha,” Aziraphale corrected, flushed and shaky. “Please, if you wouldn’t mind. Two espresso shots. Just to add a tang, I like a little tang.”
He shot Crowley a flustered glance, then hastily lowered his eyes. “And chocolate cake. And, um, um, one of th-those, um.”
“Balaclavas.”
“Baklavas,” Aziraphale said, with a slight eye-roll at Crowley. “I’m eating it, dear, I’m not wearing it.”
The barista nodded at her till. “Got that, got that. One large mocha, one slice of chocolate cake – do you want whipped cream with that? yes – aaaand, one baklava. Have here or take away?”
“Have here,” Aziraphale said. “Thank you.”
“That’ll beeee... seventeen-pound-ten. Can I interest either of you in a rewards card?”
Crowley went “Pff!”, but Aziraphale asked, “Do normal people usually get those?”
“Regular customers find them... satisfying to use, if that’s what you mean,” the barista said cautiously, leaning forward to show Aziraphale the cardboard slip. “Buy ten coffees and you get a free one.”
“Oh! Well, that’s splendid,” Aziraphale said, looking happily at Crowley. “A rewards card.” He turned back to the barista. “No punishments for lack of participation, I take it?”
The barista smiled. “We don’t offer punishments at this time, no.”
Aziraphale handed Crowley the rewards card, which was now stamped with two hearts, signed over the top with the barista’s initials, ALY.
“Is that your name?” Aziraphale asked. “Aly?”
“Aaliyah,” the barista said, handing a receipt to Crowley as he stuffed a twenty-pound note back into his breast pocket, having broken a fifty.
“Beautiful name,” Aziraphale said. “Isn’t that beautiful?” He looked expectantly at Crowley.
Crowley forced a smile. “Ssstunning.”
Aaliyah gave a genuine grin at Crowley’s discomfort, which, annoyingly, Crowley found comforting.
“Quite the old stick-in-the-mud, this one,” Aziraphale said fondly. “So, do we just...?”
“Take a seat anywhere, I’ll have someone run your order out to you once we’re done.”
“Of course. Thank you, Aaliyah. Come along, dear. It’s warm in here, isn’t it? I don’t think sitting by the fire will be necessary after all. I’d like to sit by the wall, away from that awful draft. Can feel it coming down the windows, do you feel that? Ghastly.”
They found two recently-abandoned wingback armchairs, facing each other, each ten inches from a brown brick wall, with a photographic print hung central between them, above a small, round table.
“Oh, yes! This’ll do nicely.” Aziraphale lay his coat over the arm of the left chair. He aimed his bottom at the seat as he tugged up his trousers, then sat with a sigh.
Crowley peeled off his damp coat, hung it properly around the back of his own chair, so the stiff collar put horns on the wingback. He spent a moment preening himself – black silk shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbow, waistcoat unwrinkled, silver scarf set straight – then he flung himself carelessly over the chair’s arm, letting one faux-snakeskin boot kick the air, the other leg crossing over the knee. He wiggled himself comfortable, wishing he had a wine glass to hold at the rim like he was about to drop it, because he was sure he only looked right holding a wine glass like that.
“What’s this, then, do you suppose?” Aziraphale asked, examining the wall-mounted artwork. It was a black-and-white abstract blur, as though something with sleek edges had once been in focus, but the camera slipped and the photographer missed their shot.
Crowley peered at the art from under his sunglasses. “Waste of a canvas, that’s what.”
Aziraphale raised his eyebrows. “Really?” He pulled his head back, angling it to see the art in a different way. “It looks quite tender to me.”
“That black square’s all by itself.”
“No it isn’t! There’s a grey smudge right next to it.”
“It looks like it’s falling.”
“Maybe it’s going somewhere. To meet a friend, perhaps.” Aziraphale looked a little annoyed. “Really, Crowley, you always look at everything in the worst possible light.”
Crowley spread his arms, looking around vacantly. “Need I remind you of my purpose in life?”
Aziraphale flinched an almost imperceptible amount, as if stung – maybe he had actually forgotten his dining companion was a demon. Over the past six months they’d remained in close quarters, using fewer and fewer miracles, and never once using their powers in the company of each other, each suspecting that someone Up There or Down Below was keeping track. Aziraphale was once reprimanded for ‘frivolous miracles’, which meant someone paid attention. The only way to truly disappear was to go dark. No magic. Of course, there was no keeping a suspicious angel or a vengeful demon from materialising in Soho and looking at them with an actual pair of eyeballs, but from a distance, nobody need find out Crowley and Aziraphale were sharing Aziraphale’s flat over the bookshop and dining out on a nightly basis. Maybe Aziraphale had gone so long without performing a miracle, or seeing Crowley perform his bastardised version of a miracle, that he’d forgotten they weren’t actually people.
“Me, I find the darkness and poke it,” Crowley went on, spinning a finger around the rim of the wine glass he hadn’t got. “Perhaps it’s a testament to your unshakable goodness that you look at that visual atrocity and see something tender, even after hanging around me for God-knows how many years.”
“Yes, well,” Aziraphale said primly, “I would’ve thought you liked this sort of art. All... square and flat. No colour, no vibrance whatsoever.”
Crowley pouted. “I can suffer some colour, on occasion. Wouldn’t complain if there was a sheen of gold, maybe. Could do with a shine. A sparkle.”
“Oh, yes?”
Crowley shrugged, avoiding Aziraphale’s eyes. “Living with you, I’ve kind of gotten used to all the... warm tones. Old books. Filigreed this, that, and the other.”
“Didn’t think you’d ever like gold.”
“Bahhh, silver’s still my thing,” Crowley blared roughly, looking away. “I’m having you on.”
“...No doubt.” Aziraphale adjusted his bow tie. His eyes snapped to Aaliyah, who came forward with coffee plates in each hand, smiling. “Oh, hello! Come to deliver these yourself, have you?”
“Just thought I’d take the opportunity. Black on black, one sugar for you,” Aaliyah said, sliding Crowley his cup, “And an extra-large, extra-fluffy mocha for your husband. I’ll be along with the cakes any moment. Enjoy.” She left, heading to another table to collect used cups.
Aziraphale watched her go, his lips parted, something strange and swirly brewing up inside him. It felt different to hear that word a second time. Less of a shock. More intriguing. Now he knew: it wasn’t just a passing mistake when she’d said it the first time. She really thought they were husbands.
The world had come a long way, Aziraphale thought. Even ten years ago, a kindly barista might have assumed the same thing about the pair of them – from their closeness, their fond endearments, the similarity in their corporeal age, the fact they each wore a ring on their finger, or that Crowley had outright said they were together; it hardly mattered why she made such an assumption – but she was less likely to have have said it aloud in many eras before today. Sometimes the world changed too quickly for Aziraphale to keep up, but on this particular issue, he’d been centuries ahead, holding out hope that someday people would see sense again.
Crowley had also craned his head around the protruding border of his wingback chair, looking at Aaliyah. She smiled, making conversation with the couple who’d sat down just before Crowley and Aziraphale. When Aaliyah went back to the counter, Crowley kept looking at the couple. They were young and nervous and giggled as they reached close to one another, eyes meeting, then lowering fast.
“First date,” Crowley observed, eyes cast from the man’s shaven-sided Afro to the woman’s quick smoothing of her skirt under the table. He saw their cellphones laying on the table beside them, and scoffed. “Tinder.”
“One of your more inventive temptations, was it, Tinder?” Aziraphale looked at Crowley expectantly.
“Grindr,” Crowley responded. “Saw a gap in the market and filled it. Had no particular malicious intent either way, if I’m being frank. Just don’t tell Beelzebub that.”
Aziraphale’s cheeks pinkened. “Oh, yes, that’s right. TinderwasGabriel’s.” He cleared his throat and lifted his coffee, sipping delicately at the foam.
Crowley groaned as he sat up, swivelling in his chair to face the table. He was uncomfortable sitting straight, so crooked one leg up, hooking it over his knee. He lounged forward on the table, the underside of his right bicep sliding across to Aziraphale, while he plopped his single sugarcube into his coffee, and stirred with the wrong end of his teaspoon.
“You know,” Aziraphale said, eyes drifting back to the young couple, “it’s such a strange concept, isn’t it? Courting.”
“Hm?” Crowley asked. As interested as he was in Aziraphale’s thoughts, his eyes darted to Aaliyah, as she approached again.
“Chocolate cake with whipped cream. Your baklava. And ginger cake, butter on the side. I brought you some extra cake forks for sharing. How’s the coffee treating you?”
“Just wonderful,” Aziraphale said kindly, eyes wrinkling upward as he smiled at their server. “Thank you so much, Aaliyah.”
Crowley grunted.
Aziraphale kicked him under the table.
“Absolutely... smashing,” Crowley said tonelessly. He took his first sip of coffee and muttered, eyebrows high, “Oh, that’s— That’s actually not bad.”
Aaliyah laughed gently. “Wave if you need me.”
Crowley settled back in his chair and sucked down more coffee, relaxing with the heat and the relief of finally getting what he’d been waiting for. Well, one of the things he’d been waiting for, at any rate.
Aziraphale devoted a few quiet minutes to his coffee and his baklava, making approving noises and declaring it almost as good as genuine ancient Turkish baklava, which was quite a feat for a cafe in Soho.
It was only when Aziraphale moved close with obvious designs on Crowley’s ginger cake that Crowley sniffed and asked, as a means of distraction, “Angel, what’s so strange about courting for you, exactly?”
Aziraphale’s teaspoon halted halfway to the ginger cake. His eyes met Crowley’s. “Pardon?”
“Courting. What’s wrong with it? Going out for ‘dates’. A nice fancy dinner, drinks, a trip to the cinema, the theatre, the opera, the moon – wherever. Or just a slow evening at home, bottle of wine or two, some good music. Sounds fine to me. Sounds pleasant, even. Decent way for two mutually attracted individuals to get to know each other better, I’d say. No?”
Aziraphale had coloured quickly, panic in his eyes. His lower lip bobbed, his teaspoon-holding hand retreating back to his own dessert plate.
“Of course,” Crowley tilted his head quickly, “it’s not for everyone. Can be awkward, sure. But they’re young,” he said, glancing at the nearby couple, “they do everything awkwardly.”
Crowley sucked coffee off his teaspoon handle, biting down to make the spoon spasm. He plucked it from his lips and pointed it lazily at his companion. “So, come on! What is your problem with ‘courting’?”
Wide-eyed now, Aziraphale looked put on the spot. “Ah-hh...?” His eyes darted away, then back. “Ih— It’s not that I ever had a problem with courting... It— It was really more of a timing issue, you see...” He was terribly flustered, smiling one moment, about to cry in the next. He trembled on the edge of a sentence for a few breaths, then pleaded, “Oh, Crowley, I th-thought you knew, I thought that’s why you were so patient with me... I’m so sorry, I didn’t realise you thought – if you thought I didn’t like the whole idea, because it’s not true, that’s never been true – I mean, clearly it isn’t, since we’re here, now, aren’t we? Oh, please believe me, my dear, I never would’ve—”
“Ah— Aziraphale— Slow down. What?”
“What?” Aziraphale repeated, baffled. He read the perplexion in Crowley’s face, then blurted, “Crowley, what are you on about?”
“You said—?” Crowley squinted behind his sunglasses. “Courting was a strange concept, you said.”
“When the blazes did I say that?!”
“Before—?” Crowley threw up his hands and grasped one palm to his forehead. “Before your food arrived, angel, and you distracted yourself so completely that you have no idea what I’m talking about now.”
Aziraphale shifted in embarrassment. He cleared his throat quietly.
“What got you all upset?” Crowley asked, leaning forward, his voice a low rasp. “What did you think I was talking about?”
Aziraphale pressed his lips together, shaking his head, examining his chocolate cake very carefully. “Hm, nothing. I thought the caffeine had gone to your head especially fast.”
“Did you now,” Crowley smiled, showing his teeth. “Ssso you didn’t... assume that I assumed... that you were resissssting me... for six thousand years... because you had an isssssue with dating. Dating me.”
Aziraphale shook his head vigorously, eyes on his food. “What a ridiculous thing to say. Dating you!”
“You... don’t want to talk about it, do you,” Crowley said gently. He smiled at his friend. “So let’s not. This conversation... never happened.”
Aziraphale barely looked relieved. In a flash of meeting eyes, Crowley saw a hint of regret, and Aziraphale even went as far as drawing a breath to argue, but the breath faded away, and Aziraphale started on his chocolate cake.
“Any good?” Crowley asked, which for a moment sounded like a very ironic thing for a demon to ask.
Aziraphale hesitated, then nudged the cake plate nearer Crowley. “Try some if you like.”
Crowley raised his eyebrows.
For six thousand years, Aziraphale had shared by arranging a second helping, not halving his own.
Something had changed.
Nevertheless, as Crowley drew up his spoon and eased it into the cake, splitting the seams of fibrous bubbles and scooping past the black, creamy filling, Aziraphale only watched with soft eyes, looking at Crowley’s spoon, then the night-glitter polish on his fingernails, the curve of his wrist as he twisted his spoon to his mouth, then the line of his lips as Crowley flipped the spoon and dragged it down over his bottom lip, tongue in the concaved silver.
Crowley watched him back, attention never leaving Aziraphale’s eyes.
They heard a bright giggle from the youngsters’ table, and Aziraphale glanced that way. Crowley only watched him. Watched him see whatever was going on over there, interest turning to satisfaction. He saw a touch of a smile curving the corners of Aziraphale’s lips. He saw him sink his shoulders a half-inch, drawing a happy breath in. And he watched as those love-misted eyes lingered on the couple, then moved straight to Crowley, meeting his gaze, with nary a change in his expression.
Something was horribly wrong with Crowley’s heart, and he liked it that way. Beating too hard, doing excitable backflips, turning into butterflies when he least expected it. Right now it was doing all three.
“Ginger cake, angel?” Crowley offered, pushing his plate towards Aziraphale.
“Really? Oh! Don’t mind if I do,” Aziraphale said with a smile. He dug in, and shut his eyes to savour the spice. “Mm-mm! That really is divine.”
Crowley sipped on his hot coffee, in full agreement.
Another ten minutes passed, during which Aziraphale sampled more of Crowley’s cake, and Crowley ate half of Aziraphale’s.
They even reached for each other’s coffee, hands hesitant, whispers apologetic, but smiles gentle and soft when they’d taken a few sips and returned cups to saucers.
It became comfortably quiet between them. But Aziraphale seemed to be thinking, working up to something, which made it less comfortable. Crowley said nothing of it – as, like always, he didn’t want to rush him.
It took eighteen minutes, but they got there.
“Crowley, look,” Aziraphale said firmly, peering down into the half-moon dregs of his mocha. “I don’t have an issue with courting. Nor dating. Whatever you wish to call it.”
Crowley stared at him, amazed he’d been so brave as to bring the subject up again.
Aziraphale sighed, and glanced away. “Let’s go.”
“Go— Wait, we’re leaving? That’s it?” Crowley sat up straight, alarmed that Aziraphale was getting up and pulling on his coat. “But— No seconds? No two hours of conversation followed by your staple last-minute tidbit before closing time which you eat while I... watch...?”
“I want to go home, Crowley, I feel terribly exposed here,” Aziraphale admitted, eyes down as he buttoned his coat. “Walls have ears, you always said.”
Crowley sloshed back the last of his coffee, gulping bit-by-bit as he hastened to his feet and crammed his arms into his coat sleeves, then hurried to dig money out of his pocket. When Aziraphale wasn’t looking, he darted towards Aaliyah and slipped her a twenty-pound tip. Crowley rushed away, only for her call of “Thank you, hope you have a good night!” to draw Aziraphale’s attention.
Aziraphale looked at Crowley and could see the demon’s guilt; he’d done something nice. Despite an obvious mental preoccupation, Aziraphale could barely restrain his smile, holding the cafe door open for Crowley.
Trust a demon to give a 117% tip, Crowley thought, berating himself for getting caught.
They stepped into the snarling air, at first sheltered by the porch outside the cafe, but were quickly swept up in the slash of the snowfall beyond. Aziraphale hurled out a lungful of vapour, already digging for his gloves. Crowley grasped his ungloved hands into fists and buried them deep in his pockets, shoulders high, shielding his neck with his collar.
“Should’ve brought the Bentley,” Crowley uttered, as snow sliced down, and his cheekbones practically sharpened.
“And miss the pleasure of walking home with you?” Aziraphale said, snow twinkling on his eyelashes. “Never. Besides, until you get your real human driver’s license, legally, you’re driving nowhere.”
Crowley stalked by his companion’s left side, head down against the wind.
Aziraphale strolled happily along, as if the start of a blizzard was nothing more than a delicate touch of fairy dust.
Blessedly – for want of a better word – the snow eased off by the time they reached the first corner. Crowley sighed in relief, able to lift his chin without wincing.
Soon they walked the desolate street, footsteps tapping on the melted mush.
Not too long later, Crowley felt the slight press of perfect flakes collapsing under his boot sole.
One layer became two, and the night became silent. Whispers passed them, the occasional car swishing through dark lines cut by the car in front.
“Crowley,” Aziraphale said, as they slowed their walk.
“Hm?” Crowley looked at him and kept walking.
Aziraphale gulped. He looked straight ahead as he took a breath, then turned his face but not his eyes to Crowley. “What I never understood about courting, in general terms,” he said, lightly, “particularly the type done in modern times... What I’ll surely never understand is how anyone would want to put themselves in that situation on purpose.”
“How do you mean?”
“I mean— Meeting someone, perhaps knowing only some arbitrary, surface-level details about them. Placing meaning upon the fact they find their face attractive.”
“Or some other part of them,” Crowley murmured, earning him a tut.
“That’s what’s odd,” Aziraphale said, stepping left to avoid a wonky paver, bumping into Crowley’s side. He didn’t correct his path once the crooked slab was behind them, so they walked on, arms in contact. “People spend their time getting to know one-another past the exterior view, somehow not already knowing whether they’ll get along with that person forever. It baffles me to madness, almost. How can they not know?”
Crowley found this deeply fascinating.
“Why spend so much time with someone if you don’t already like them?” Aziraphale asked, spreading his hands out, lifting them up a bit, then tucking them back into his pockets. “Why would anyone go on a date unless they already loved their partner?”
Crowley’s heart did several unholy things in reaction to those words, and he enjoyed each immensely. His smile was secretive, but heartfelt.
“Why meet someone new, specifically for the purpose of maybe falling in love,” Aziraphale asked, eyes turned to the cloud-massed sky, “when you could love your friend? Your best friend.”
“That is a good question,” Crowley smiled, eyes never leaving the left of Aziraphale’s face as they walked along. “Plenty of humans would agree with you, I’d bet.”
“Because, really,” the flush on Aziraphale’s cheeks became more noticeable as he carried on, matter-of-factly, “if they’re your best friend then you know you’re in love with them, don’t you? It’s obvious.”
Crowley smiled. “Is that how you think it works, angel? Best friend equals... love? Romantic love?”
“Well, isn’t it?!” Aziraphale huffed. He caught on a breath, then stated, with great determination, “I’m your best friend. And you— Well, I... I think you do—”
“Yeah,” Crowley smiled.
He did.
Oh, how he did.
“Mm-hm.” Aziraphale nodded. “There, you see. Proves it.”
Crowley quirked his head and twitched an eyebrow, unable to find a fault in that particular argument, at least when it came to the two of them. Each of them had the other as a best friend, and was in love with him. So technically that made Aziraphale 100% correct in this case.
“Anyway, that’s all,” Aziraphale said, shrugging a shoulder. “You asked why I found the concept of courting strangers odd, and that’s why.”
“Texting and Tinder is hardly courting as we know it, though, angel,” Crowley sniffed. “Not like how it was in the old days, with sonnets and serenades and ransacking the enemy village to bring back a blood bounty for your loved one.”
“No. If I were to define it, I say things ought to be in the middle,” Aziraphale said forthrightly, with a nod. “No nonsense faffing around, trying to sing or play a lute. No ransacking. No texting. Just...” He trailed off, looking wistfully at the street ahead.
“Just... mmm, dinner, every night, maybe,” Crowley said, longingly. “An unspoken promise... of a safe place to come back to.”
“Precisely. You know exactly what I mean. See! This is why humans shouldn’t go rushing into things with strangers. Nobody could ever know someone as well as you know me, and I know you.”
“They don’t have six thousand years to find out if someone’s a good match, angel.”
“Well, that’s true.” Aziraphale swallowed.
Only a few moments later, Aziraphale uttered, airily, “Dinner and a safe place...” His lips pressed together. “Hm. That does sound like... marriage, somewhat, doesn’t it? People find that safety with others. Make homes. Little nests, raise children. Feed them.”
“All in a rush, apparently,” Crowley said, fondness for both humanity and Aziraphale creeping into his voice. “They almost have to make it quick, don’t they – ‘rushing into things’. Otherwise it’s all over.”
“Quite.”
They walked in silence for a while, slowing more and more as the bookshop came into view.
Aziraphale bolted through with the angelic equivalent of adrenaline. Six thousand years slow, and now the bookshop was so close and their walk was at an end, it seemed like time was running out to say what he was aching to say. If they were really going to live as humans, then he had to act like them and move fast.
So Aziraphale took a breath. “Come to think of it, Crowley... ‘husband’ has a nice ring to it.” He looked up, meeting Crowley’s startled eyes. “Doesn’t it?”
“Dhh... Does it?” Crowley said, as his brain did absolutely nothing. “Probably. Hadn’t even thought about it. Ever. At all.”
“Husband,” Aziraphale said again, a smile on his lips, eyes on Crowley’s reddening cheeks. “Hm.”
“Wh-whwwwh,” Crowley said. “Whathhhh... Um.”
Aziraphale had gone a little shy. “Oh, I don’t know. Ignore me. Perhaps I’m being silly.”
“No... no, what,” Crowley reached for Aziraphale, taking the wrist of his coat. “What were you... going to say?”
“It’s nothing, really,” Aziraphale said, head down. “Well, not nothing. Only that—” Their eyes met, and they stopped walking to look at each other. “Might we try it?”
“Try...?”
“Being husbands.”
Crowley blinked. His lips parted, slowly unsticking. His heart didn’t know what to do yet, so buzzed, loudly, all over.
“I don’t mean we’d get married,” Aziraphale hastened to add. “Because, really, truly, what would the point be? After six thousand years of knowing each other, Crowley, being friends, being close friends, best friends... Having those dinners, dates or not... Having those safe places, safe moments together, being prepared to do anything to... to protect each other...? Raising Warlock together. Finding family, around us, between us – and more and more and more, every day, Crowley, feeling— Feeling.” Aziraphale gave a soft smile. “As far as I’m concerned, we’re—”
“Already married,” Crowley muttered, as Aziraphale stammered the same words.
They went still, caught in each other’s gaze. A car passed by, and the flash of its lights bloomed like a halo behind Crowley’s quiff of red hair, casting a spiked, moving shadow across Aziraphale’s face.
Aziraphale lowered his lashes, a faint smile on his lips. “Like I said. Silly.”
“Sssilly,” Crowley echoed, hollowly.
Aziraphale clenched and unclenched his gloved hands. “Too silly.”
Before he dared walk away, Crowley snatched up his left hand.
Aziraphale stilled. They were close enough together to feel the heat of each other’s breath.
Crowley, with a heartbeat he didn’t need thumping insistently in his throat, gently loosened Aziraphale’s glove, pinching once at each fingertip. He pulled the glove free, baring Aziraphale’s hand to the night.
A breathless whisper... “Crowley...”
Crowley kissed Aziraphale’s icy fingertips, holding his gaze. Aziraphale stopped breathing for a moment, lips apart. Then a rush of vapour poured forth once more.
With a tender smile, Crowley lowered Aziraphale’s now-naked hand to their sides, and slipped his own palm to hold it. Cold fingers, hot palms.
The relief Crowley felt doing that was beyond satisfying, as he’d sated the deepest, most secret craving he’d ever had. All of the deepest desires of every human who lived now, or ever came before, in the entire history of world, even in summation, could never compare to how badly he’d wanted this.
And yet all he could do now was smile, quietly, softly, as he knew – as Aziraphale knew – that this was how they were always meant to be. The world began with them, and didn’t end with them. And it would go on with them, as they went on with it, together. Somehow the two of them were at the heart of it all – so, how fitting was it that they were bound by heart to each other, as much as they were to the lives around them and the funny little planet below their feet?
They gazed at each other, considering this development, neither noticing as the snow began to decorate their hair again, giving it a sparkle.
Eventually Aziraphale let free another small smile, accompanied by an equally-small breath. “Home?” he asked.
Crowley nodded.
They turned and walked again, this time hand-in-hand.
“Can an angel and a demon really be husbands?” Crowley asked, with the usual throaty rasp in his voice, pretending it wasn’t a strikingly scary thing to talk about their new reality aloud, when he’d gone millenia saying nothing. “Wouldn’t both angel and demon have to be men? And last time I checked, angel, neither of us are... that.”
“Would you rather be wives?”
“Hm, someday?” Crowley smiled softly, leading Aziraphale backwards up the steps of the bookshop. “Husband and wife. Spouse and... other spouse. But like you said, angel. ‘Husband’ does have a pleasant ring to it.”
Aziraphale unlocked the bookshop one-handed, as his left hand was occupied. His eyes were also occupied, as he couldn’t take them off Crowley.
After some fumbling, the door clicked open, and Aziraphale was about to push it wide, but Crowley stilled him, hands holding hands, wanting the moment to last a little longer. Six thousand years hoping things would move faster, and now he wanted time to slow. Just to enjoy this for longer, to feel the sting of ice on their skin, the freshness of the air, the way the northern hemisphere slept, cleansing itself for a new year once spring came. They needed another moment here, waiting, wanting, hoping and praying that they could keep each other safe this way, by being people, moving fast, staying quiet, keeping each other closer than they’d ever been before.
Crowley leaned close and rested his forehead on Aziraphale’s snow-chilled cheek, eyes closed. He drew in the sweet, familiar scent of his best friend, then pulled back, smiling serenely, yellow eyes aglow in the edge of the streetlights. “What if we’re wrong?” he whispered, as his smile faded. “Angel... what if this isn’t what we’re meant to do?”
Aziraphale grinned, which was not at all what Crowley expected. All this time learning everything about him and the angel could still surprise him.
“My dear,” Aziraphale said softly, touching a thumb to Crowley’s jaw, fingers curled beneath. “You ‘find the darkness and poke it’. I believe those were your words. I’ll let you into my heart, Crowley, but don’t you think you’ll ever change me at the core, not really. Not where it matters. You can sow no seeds of doubt in me, now. Not about this. And you never will.”
Crowley realised now, as he had a thousand times before, that he was programmed to play devil’s advocate, designed to lead others astray. What if you indulged in two desserts instead of one? What if this artwork was never as beautiful as you thought it was? What if you’re wrong? What if we’re both wrong?
“Crowley... Is this what you want?” Aziraphale asked. There was nothing but openness in his eyes. “Am I... what you want?” He expected honesty, even if the truth might hurt.
Crowley hugged his right hand to Aziraphale’s left, and pushed their interlocked knuckles against the bookshop door, easing it open. He stepped inside, leading Aziraphale out of the snow and into their safe place, the safest home there ever was.
“Yes,” he said, and it was a promise.
{ the end }