Chapter Text
“What do you think?”
There’s three people in the room. The one who’s just spoken has remarkably messy, grey-brown hair that looks like it’s been caught in a gale and frozen there, is wearing a dark grey t-shirt with jeans, and overall appears to be the kind of man who would be something of a self-taught, renegade wizard in a Dungeons & Dragons campaign who frequently sets things on fire, among those things being his own hair.[1]
The room is his, a darkened room in his own home. His wife is busy elsewhere, his children are at school, and so the home is deserted save for himself and his two visitors. Polar opposites, one would think upon seeing them, and they wouldn’t necessarily be wrong.
The two visitors look at each other. One of them, a jovial, middle-aged man in a crisp cream-colored suit with wrinkles on his face from smiling so much, fluffy white-blond hair, and a slightly heavyset build that would be intimidating on anyone else, opens his mouth to say something, then shuts it again.
His companion, a leaner, meaner redhead with dark sunglasses and what is colloquially referred to as a fuckboy haircut accentuating his own dark suit, raises his hand, motions for the other to go ahead and speak already.
“I’m afraid I’m not typically one to watch television,” the first says apologetically.
“Well, I liked it,” the second cuts in. “Is that David Tennant you have playing me?”
“And Michael Sheen as Aziraphale,” the author replies. “It wasn’t all my decisions, but I thought you’d appreciate those choices.”
“I... don’t know who either of those people are,” Aziraphale says in an equally apologetic tone.
Crowley claps him on the shoulder. “This, angel, is why you should keep up on current events.”
“I do!”
“You started crying when I told you Freddie Mercury was dead.”
“Yes, and?”
Neil finds himself smiling. Even though he and Terry had never really gotten all the details, just the basic facts and free rein to make up anything they needed to, as well as to change names where necessary, et cetera, et cetera, he’d had a fairly good idea from the first time these two contacted them that their relationship was, perhaps, a bit more than friends.
Terry would have been happy to be proven right, because while that line about angels being sexless unless they made an effort was verbatim Aziraphale, he strongly suspected all along that they’d both been making an effort. Or maybe they weren't, maybe they both are asexual.
Either way, Neil’s happy for them, even if he likely will never get a clarification verbally. They certainly are rather cute together. Aziraphale gets all puffed up when he’s flustered, opening and shutting his mouth in a way that’s reminiscent to a gaping fish. But he’s also looking at Crowley with clear adoration in his eyes, and while Crowley’s clearly having fun at Aziraphale’s expense, that same adoration’s reflected there.
Neil wonders, briefly, if they were actually together-together or not when he and Terry were working on Good Omens . Terry had bet they were. Neil had bet they weren’t, not that he wouldn’t have been happy to be proven wrong.
Even so, Neil clears his throat. “This is just the trailer,” he informs Aziraphale. “The show itself is still in production and honestly, it’s going to be a while. Maybe not by your standards.”
“Long by my standards is a millennium,” Aziraphale says back.
Neil happens to glance down a little, and— Crowley is holding Aziraphale’s hand and neither of them seem to have noticed . Or maybe they have. Neil sincerely hopes they have. If they’re not together, Neil is going to find his own copy of Good Omens and eat it.[2]
“Nowhere near that long,” Neil says. “Anyway, what I guess I’m saying is, uh, any last thoughts on where you want the show to go, how different you want it to be from the book?”
“You could… have more flashback sequences?” Aziraphale suggests. “Or rather, any flashback sequences. Beyond the one at the beginning that is, the only flashback being about me losing my sword is rather dreary, don’t you think?”
Neil shrugs. “Give me material to work with, I’ll see what I can do. Shouldn’t take a miracle to make this a decent adaption.” He glances to Crowley, continues, “You’ve been quiet. Nothing to say?”
“You wish,” Crowley says, clearly amused. “Distracted.”
For a few moments, Neil thinks he’s talking about Aziraphale, but then he lifts up his phone and Neil sees what appears to be Candy Crush .
“One of my better works,” the demon says proudly.
“Before you got addicted yourself,” Aziraphale cuts in, clearly amused.
Crowley, of course, is much less so. “Angel, you try playing this and just playing one level. It’s impossible. ”
Neil clears his throat again and says, “So… anything we should change?”
“Well,” Crowley leans back on the couch, seemingly thinks it over. Neil strongly suspects he’s already thought it over and is being dramatic. “The trailer makes it seem like we’re not friends.”
“That’s probably to attract the fanfiction writers. They love that sort of thing.” Neil shrugs. “The trailer’s up on the internet already, but I’ll see what I can do to fix that part.”
“Oh no, keep it, it’s great.” Crowley lifts a hand to his sunglasses, lowers them, meets Neil’s gaze with yellow eyes filled with, of all things, mirth. “But the show? Make it gayer.”
Aziraphale, who had just reached for the cup of hot cocoa he’d been nursing for the past half hour and had tentatively taken a sip, audibly chokes on it.[3]
“Crowley!”
It hadn’t taken him long to miracle away the choking, apparently. Neil would love to be able to do that. As it is, he’s glad he wasn’t drinking anything, because he nearly choked on nothing but air and his own spit.
“What? It’s 2019, angel. Have you seen the internet lately?”
“I don’t own a computer. You know this.”
“Hate to interrupt, but uh… you really should get a computer,” Neil says, feeling about as out of his depth as a deep sea fish flopping around in the Himalayas. “They’re useful.”
“I’ll make sure he gets a computer,” Crowley promises. “Make the show gayer.”
He slides his glasses back up, but not before Neil catches a hint of what appears to be confirmation in his eyes.
For his part, Neil Gaiman, author and apparent friend to two supernatural beings, pretends to be surprised.[4]