Chapter Text
Brooklyn, September 27, 1936.
“Really, Az, it’s not a big deal,” Crowley smiled, unlocking the door to his apartment and allowing his companion to enter first.
“You got into a bar fight. That seems like a pretty big deal to me,” Aziraphale frowned, sitting on Crowley’s surprisingly simple red-cushioned couch. His fingers drummed against the wooden armrest to his right as he watched Crowley put out his cigarette in a nearby ashtray. “Are you sure your nose is alright? I could always fix it up, you know.”
“I think it’ll be fine.” He dabbed at the skin above his upper lip and came away with a bit of blood. “It’s not broken, it’ll heal by tomorrow morning. Plus, it makes me look cool.”
“I don’t see how blood pouring out of your nose can make you look ‘cool’, or whatever sort of slang you prefer. Besides, it’s not like you’ll be meeting anyone worth impressing. It’s just going to be you and me, after all.”
“You say that as if you’re not worth impressing.” Crowley sat down beside his friend, sipping at the glass of whiskey that appeared in his hand. Aziraphale rolled his eyes, conjuring a shallow glass of red wine and taking a sip himself.
“It’s difficult to impress someone who’s witnessed you drunkenly sob over Frankenstein.”
“Oh, come on, angel, that was a sad movie!”
“How on His green Earth is Frankenstein sad?”
“He was misunderstood!”
The two bantered for a while, arguing over the moral merits of Doctor Frankenstein and the other antagonists of the horror films they had watched together over the years. After they were thoroughly tipsy, Crowley stood and began to pace.
“I mean, obviously Hyde is a bad guy, angel, but he was half of an overall good whole!”
“As soon as you get into that blasted ‘half of a whole’ nonsense, I lose all sense of understanding,” Aziraphale muttered, rubbing his temples in an attempt to do away with his mounting headache.
“It’s like if we were two people trapped in the same body,” Crowley explained, “except one of us is a doctor and the other is a psychopath.”
“I want to be the doctor.”
“No fair!” Crowley laughed, falling onto the couch and accidentally bouncing right back off in the process. He was now lying on the carpet, nursing a freshly produced glass of liquor.
“Time,” Aziraphale yawned, placing his empty wine glass on the coffee table, where it quickly lost its footing and fell, rolling to the edge of the table and landing on Crowley’s face.
“What about it?” Crowley mumbled, throwing the glass across the room, where it shattered to bits on the carpet. Neither parties seemed to notice.
“What is it?”
“Like, theo… theoretic’lly?”
“No, what’s the bloody time?”
“Oh.” Crowley checked his watch. “Jus’ past 1:00. Why, you planning to leave?”
“Yeah, I think so,” Aziraphale replied simply, standing and stumbling a bit as he threw his coat back on. “I guess I have to sober up if I’m going to get a taxi, eh?”
“I mean, I guess you don’t have to,” Crowley replied despite the fact that Aziraphale’s face was already thoroughly scrunched up as the alcohol left his blood.
“Right, well, I ought to be off.”
“Right.”
Crowley shakily got to his feet, holding a hand out for Aziraphale to shake. It felt oddly formal, especially considering the immensely deep conversation about monsters they had just had. But, hey, Crowley was still shitfaced, so it seemed like the proper way to say goodbye to a very close friend.
Aziraphale smiled, taking the demon’s hand and pulling him into a hug. “Don’t forget to sober up before bed, dearest. Otherwise, you’ll wake up with an awful headache,” he said quietly.
The impromptu embrace was more than enough of a surprise for the whiskey in Crowley’s blood to evaporate, leaving him both sober and a bit stunned.
The angel gave Crowley a light smile and a quick pat on the shoulder before leaving, the door clicking politely behind him.
And then Crowley was alone. As alone as one can be when confronted by a hailstorm of thought, that is.
Sure, Aziraphale was affectionate. That sort of came with being an angel, didn’t it? Yes, affection, that was sort of the whole thing. Angels had their emotions and compassion, and demons were meant to be cold and calculated. How ironic, Crowley thought, that Heaven was almost essentially an office building run by an intense hypochondriac and that Hell was nothing more than a pit of screams and ash and ruthless impulsivity.
Yes, how funny it was.
What had he been thinking about again?
Ah, yes. Aziraphale.
Yes, he’s compassionate, but the only times they had ever “hugged” before were when they were both utterly smashed and at least partially conscious of it, so there was never any real tenderness or care in them. The embraces were mostly for the purpose of keeping both of them from falling over. This hug felt different from that. Different and strange and scary and new.
And, despite there only being a few measly letters tacked on at the end, “dearest” was incredibly different from “dear”, or at least it was to Crowley. Wording is everything, after all, right up there with money and political power and all the other nonsense humans had made in a clear attempt to destroy the society they had so messily built for themselves.
But Crowley was a chronic overthinker and well aware of it, thus deciding that it was just the fantastical part of his brain overcoming that of the logical.
Perhaps fantastical wasn’t the best way to phrase it. After all, it implied unintended fictional indulgence of some form, which was most certainly not present. Not in the slightest.
Deciding to resolve the matter in the morning, likely by forgetting the whole blasted thing, Crowley strode to his room and collapsed, not bothering to change out of his tasteful button-up and vest as his head crashed into the pillows. Wrinkles were a problem for Future Crowley to deal with.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
It was very rare for Present Crowley (who was, in reality, Future Crowley, but only in relation to Past Crowley) to at all tolerate Past Crowley. Past Crowley was, in fact, a twat, and Present Crowley was getting incredibly tired of him. Like now, for example. Past Crowley had neglected to take his sunglasses off before falling asleep face-down, and as a result, Present Crowley now had red lines pressed into his face by the metal frames. He groaned, peeling the glasses off of his face and tossing them unceremoniously onto his bedside table.
After a few minutes of stalling, Crowley swung his legs over the side of the bed, noticing the blinking 10:05 on his alarm clock as he peered around. He was surprised to have woken up so early; he tried to keep his naps to a minimum of 12 hours, but 18 was his usual goal. But it seemed that today, 8 would be all he got.
He stood up to make himself some coffee, only then realizing the scratch at the back of his throat, probably from sleeping with his mouth open. Shrugging his shoulders, Crowley let the thought slide past him and decided to resolve the matter later. Right now, coffee was the highest and only priority.
The process of making coffee was, admittedly, a bit tedious, but Crowley enjoyed it nonetheless. It gave him time to think without worrying about the next thing, and the thing after that, and so on and so forth. Yes, waiting for his coffee was the most productive part of his day, from a certain standpoint.
His plans of contemplation were halted by the discovery of a note left on his counter. Picking up the bit of paper, Crowley was surprised to find the scratchy and thin handwriting of an old accomplice.
Crawly (or Crowley, or whatever the hell it is now),
It’s been a while. Something important is going on, and I figured you should be the fourth one to know (sorry, had to tell the other Three first, you know how they can be). I’m quitting, which is apparently as easy as filing a two weeks’ notice. Damn penicillin got me in the end, it seems. I just wanted to let you know one last time that causing epidemics with you was an absolute blast (bubonic and smallpox were my personal favorites). I was going to stop in last night to tell you in person, but you seemed quite caught up with that little angel friend of yours. I’ve given you a farewell gift. Good luck.
Sincerely yours, Pestilence.
Well, that would explain the scratchy throat. He had a bit of an upset stomach, too, now that he thought of it. This certainly wasn’t the first time Pestilence had made him ill as a practical joke, and knowing the bastard, the situation would probably get to be far worse than just a bellyache, so Crowley made the mental note to be extra careful for the next few days. But for now, he had other things to attend to.
He made his coffee, far more carefully than usual this time just in case something went horribly wrong and he ended up on the ground. Coffee stains were a bitch to get rid of, even for a demon.
Just as he was finally sitting down, coffee in hand- two sugars, one cream, just like usual- the telephone rang from across the room. Crowley sighed, placing his drink on the coffee table before shuffling to the phone and putting the handset to his ear.
“Wotcher?”
“Given up on acting like a New Yorker, eh?” Aziraphale laughed through the phone, his own English accent just a bit more refined than Crowley’s vaguely Cockney one.
“Pretty much. How’d you know I’d be awake?”
“Lucky guess.”
“Huh. Well, what’s goin’ on, then? You need to cancel for tonight?”
“Oh, no, nothing like that. I just wanted to ask how your nose was doing.”
“Oh. Just about fine. Got some blood on my pillow, but it could certainly be worse. You get back to the bookshop all right last night?”
“And you say I’m the fussy one. Yes, I got home all in one piece. I’m calling you, aren’t I?”
Crowley hummed in agreement, wishing he had brought his coffee as his mouth fumbled for something to do.
“Customer,” Aziraphale said quickly, “got to be going. I’ll see you tonight?”
“Oh. Um, yea-”
The line went dead.
Crowley let the handset fall back into the receiver, slumping over to the couch with a disappointed groan. His hands quivered lightly as he put the coffee mug to his lips, taking a drawn-out sip and almost immediately coughing it back up. The fit of coughs lasted for at least a good thirty seconds before he spat out a small clot of blood. No, not quite... Crowley’s brow furrowed as he inspected it closer.
A yellow flower.
Crowley scoffed, tossing the flower into the garbage can and walking briskly to the bathroom to wash his hands. Was that really the best that Pestilence had for him? A flower or two? It felt a bit juvenile, especially for his last big hurrah before retirement; the Horseman’s pranks were usually far more elaborate than some silly flora.
The rest of his morning was spent mostly milling around the flat. He brushed his teeth (another unnecessary practice he’d gotten into the habit of over the years) and precisely slicked his hair back. It probably could’ve used a trim, but he was beginning to grow fond of having it just a bit longer.
Around 2:00, thoroughly bored of sitting around, he whipped his sunglasses on and walked the two blocks down to the beach. Living so close to Coney Island certainly had its cons, but getting to watch the workers close the place down for the winter was well worth the late summer nights full of drunken chatter outside his window and annoying tourists asking for directions.
Crowley slipped a metal flask out of his pocket, taking a swig of the scotch inside as he sat on the curb in front of the park’s entrance. He watched through the gate as workers in overalls and hats took down signs, double- and triple-checked the rides, and wiped down tables at the food courts.
His brief moment of leisure was interrupted by a tickle at the back of his throat. He coughed, feeling quite like a cat with a hairball as he attempted to hack up the perturbation in his esophagus. He eventually gave up, sticking his finger into the back of his throat and gagging as he pulled out another bloody petal, this time in a rich purple hue.
The petal remained abandoned on the roadside as he sauntered his way back to his apartment.