Chapter Text
London, January 1967
Crowley doesn’t ask for help. Crowley tends to wade deeper into trouble until he can’t get out and then accept whatever happens as his due. So, this time, Aziraphale is shocked when his phone rings and the first things he hears is the demon saying ‘’Ziraphale, will you help me?’
‘Yes. Of course. My dear…’ As if he’s ever been able to refuse him anything, save the only other thing he’d ever asked for.
He starts gathering things, listening to Crowley breathing. It’s not a pleasant sound and there’s no attempt at speech.
‘What’s wrong? Where are you?’
Another flare of breathing, uncomfortably harsh. ‘Park…Kensington. Jusss…’
He can feel Crowley thinking about saying ‘Nothing’s wrong.’ Feels the distress coming from his friend, as clear as if they were sitting together. He’s grabbed his coat now, found everything he might want within his reach. ‘Won’t be long. On my way. Listen –’ He can’t think what to say next, so he settles for ‘Crowley, my dear, it’s alright.’
The noise he gets in reply isn’t a sob, because if it was, he’d never be able to put the phone down and break the conversation even to go and help.
A passing taxi driver finds himself in a blinding hurry to get across town and doesn’t really remember the journey afterwards. He does find a £5 note he’d forgotten about in his wallet that evening, and his troublesome neighbour moves out the next morning, so he never does get around to checking his mileage.
Aziraphale steps out into the bitter cold of a January afternoon in London; the air’s cold enough to sting if he lets it. The sky is cruel with the threat of snow, trees a black shadow of themselves against it. In the midst of all the grey, it’s easy to spot a flame haired figure on the bench.
He hadn’t known what he was expecting. Of course, Crowley couldn’t have taken time to find a phone box in the middle of a fight. But maybe afterwards… Or help with a job, a temptation or something going wrong. He would have expected chaos, activity, something.
Instead, there’s Crowley slouched in a different way to normal, and so much emptiness. He almost thinks the demon might have miracled it so he could be alone.
It’s quicker to walk across the grass. Let Crowley tease him for that once everything gets sorted out.
‘Crowley? Crowley!’ He doesn’t run, because it doesn’t look like there’s anything that can be solved by running, but he does hurry.
Crowley half turns to look at him, and then Aziraphale does run, because it’s wrong, so wrong, and he can see the distress in those yellow eyes from here; see that something is terrifyingly, horrifyingly wrong and Crowley looks –
Angelic will can move a body very fast indeed, if said angel isn’t too concerned about others seeing. He slows down for the last few strides though and walks up to Crowley, trying not to startle him.
‘You came,’ and the fact that there’s surprise there hurts Aziraphale in a way he can hardly articulate. Of course he’d come if Crowley needed him. (As long as he only asks for the right things, a voice reminds him.)
‘Crowley, what’s happ –?’
A hand flaps weakly, and he bites off the rest of the question. Instead, he risks sitting on the bench, much closer than he normally would. It’s cold, after all, and Crowley won’t usually leave his flat in January, let alone sit in a park.
As he sits down, he sees Crowley’s sunglasses. They’re smashed on the ground by his feet.
‘What do you want?’ he manages to ask. It feels a safer one. He can give Crowley that much, at least.
**
He wants to go home. Wants it so badly he can taste it even over the bloody mess he’s made of his mouth. Bite your tongue isn’t meant to be a real thing, he knows that, but it’s easier than speaking. Wants to go home, have the walls around him and the warmth, the light, the barriers that keep everyone else away.
His feet are soaked through his boots; the grass around the bench has long since been trampled to liquid mud. The rest of him is just cold. He’s too drunk to even make an attempt at a miracle.
Aziraphale is here at least, and maybe that’s enough miracles for today. He’d been planning on sitting here until it got dark at least, perhaps drinking some more if he could keep miracling it. Hadn’t wanted to but it had been the best plan he could manage.
‘Home,’ he says softly, in response to a question that he senses rather than hears. ‘Home?’ and he forces back the rest of that sentence, because ‘I want’ isn’t something he’s allowed to have, and ‘please’…Well, he feels like he’s used up a lifetime’s worth of begging today and none of it had been listened to.
‘Of course, my dear,’ and Aziraphale turns a little, coming closer. He can sense the angel’s determination, the surety that everything will be alright, and his stupid body wants to believe him. He can feel the desire to lean against him, look for the comfort that had been absent earlier; trust in the fact that Aziraphale might be able to make all this go away.
‘You’re cold,’ Aziraphale says softly and unbuttons his jacket. Lays it across Crowley’s lap. He doesn’t think he’s ever had anyone offer him clothes before; he goes to stroke it, straighten it, but his hands are shaking. That’s…well, not new, but unexpected. The last time had been over 40 years ago in an outpost of Hell the humans had called Ypres. Aziraphale hadn’t been there then. Nothing of Heaven had been near the Western Front.
He blinks, realising he’d missed something, and finds Aziraphale saying ‘here, it’s alright, I’ll do it,’ and the coat is soothed across his thighs. It’s such a human gesture that his throat burns. Another brush and this one ends up touching the useless tangle of his hands, knotted on his lap.
It’s warm and he wants to pull away, but he can’t move. Can’t breath.
Aziraphale’s hand rests on both of his. ‘Oh, my dear. My dearest. We’ll get you home. Of course we can go home. It’ll be alright.’
He wants to tell Aziraphale that it isn’t alright; that it can’t be alright because it’s already over, but he can’t risk opening his mouth. Can’t risk moving or speaking at the moment, because it’s taking every scrap of focus to control his corporation, and Aziraphale’s hand is wearing away at that control.
He gulps, a snake’s choking down of horror, sickness, loss of control that doesn’t work. Gulps again, sucking in air that doesn’t satisfy any of his forms, and the way everything’s swirling isn’t just the alcohol.
‘Crowley?’
He shakes his head, meaning ‘please don’t ask me to speak,’ and Aziraphale’s other hand is on his back, tracing around where his wings would be. It’s the most loving touch he’s received in centuries; the contrast between it and earlier wears through the thread he’s been clinging to.
He wrenches away from Aziraphale – has just enough time to see hurt shading through blue eyes – to collapse over the edge of the bench, and vomits. Aziraphale’s hands are back on him long before he’s finished, a stream of nonsense syllables coalescing into ‘Crowley, my dearest, my dear Crowley, Crowley, it’s OK, Crowley, Crowley, Crowley.’
From that mouth, his name sounds like a blessing. Abstractedly, he’s aware the demons should have more control over their corporations but his yellow eyes stream tears, and his stomach churns and if he could stop being sick long enough, he’d be able to identify his emotions as revulsion / horror / grief / disgust / hate / horror / anger / horror but all he can do is lean there and be human.
Human reactions for humans, and maybe that’s alright.
Aziraphale doesn’t let go.
Eventually, he falls back onto the bench and sits forward, with his head hanging down. He’s ruined Aziraphale’s coat and probably some of his own clothes as well. He gets a few raw words through an apology – Satan, his throat hurts –
‘Do you really think I care about a bloody coat, Crowley? Right now?’
He manages to shake his head without feeling that he’s fracturing into non-existence, and wonders if that’s a good thing.
‘What happened, my dear?’
One cold hand – useless, hateful thing that won’t work – fumbles in his pocket. He pulls out a medal and waves it near Aziraphale. He’s had it 17 hours.
‘They – they gave me a fucking citation for it.’
He feels the cool weight of Aziraphale’s regard on him, the angel looking, thinking; probably remembering the Spanish Inquisition. He’d come and dragged Crowley out of a tavern then.
He’s expecting condemnation. Instead, Aziraphale sighs and says ‘that’s good, they won’t be looking for you then. Can you stand?’
It takes him a lot more effort than he’d like to admit, the cold eating away at his strength.
**
Aziraphale has to help Crowley up. He’s not going to continue the conversation here, even if the demon wasn’t freezing to death. One quick miracle to dry most of Crowley’s clothing and his shaggy hair; another to fix and clean his sunglasses. He holds them out.
‘Here you go.’
Crowley half turns to look at him. His eyes are nearly completely yellow and his face is streaked with tears and dirt.
‘No. Not that pair. Not wearing that pair,’ and he almost recoils from them.
Aziraphale drops them into a rubbish bin that wasn’t there before and says softly ‘OK, they’ve gone.’
Crowley sways where he stands, and Aziraphale wishes either of them had ever figured out a way of sobering someone else up. It’s too intimate, requires far too much going into other people’s minds to work.
‘Home?’ Crowley mutters in a voice too soft for mortal hearing. ‘Please can we go home?’
There’s another black cab just by the gate – and the driver doesn’t say anything when they both get in the back, or want to talk at all. All the traffic lights are green and all the roads are clear, and Crowley slumps against the window, staring at his medal and they’re crossing a bridge when he abruptly opens the window and throws it out. Aziraphale can hear the leaden thud of it hitting the surface of the Thames; sinking out of knowledge and under the oily scum of the water in a few minutes.
Gone. He looks across at Crowley.
‘Gave me a fucking medal for – that.’ His jaw’s working like he’s about to be sick again. Aziraphale lies a hand on his leg and thinks with every sense he has, every scrap of Grace he possesses, peace. Be at peace. It won’t last, of course, but it might get through the journey.
They pull up at Crowley’s flat under a sky that’s already black with night and full of starshine. He doesn’t want to be here.
Aziraphale comes around and opens the door for him, helps him out. Strange. Unfamiliar. Undeserved, and he stands against the ebony slab of his own front door, hiding from the world, while Aziraphale talks to the driver. The starlight all seems to be concentrating on the angel.
He tries to think ahead, through the next couple of weeks, but can’t focus on the next few minutes. He doesn’t want to be here. Aziraphale will leave him alone shortly, if he comes in at all.
He never has before.
‘’Ziraphale?’ comes out as a slurred mess; he turns anyway, instantly, and looks at him. One hand is still lent casually on the driver’s door.
‘Angel, I don’t…’ and the rest of that sentence was something he couldn’t say, because Aziraphale had brought him here anyway, so he settles for another truth. ‘I don’t feel well.’
A blur of movement. The cab ushered away, the lift is there, Aziraphale is there; the world is forced out of his awareness for a moment.
Crowley slumps onto the floor, because aside from the throne, there really isn’t anywhere else to sit. He’s never had company here before, or at least company that he’d actually wanted.
A wing creeps around him, staves some of the misery away.
‘Drink this,’ and he doesn’t need his eyes open to sense the water that Aziraphale’s holding up for him. Swallowing is an effort , as is staying still when Aziraphale’s hand moves from the glass to his cheek.
The room is cold. He’d left the door to the plant room open earlier, whatever day or week or whenever earlier had been, and…he doesn’t want Aziraphale to see the plants and start asking about them. He doesn’t want to spend the rest of the night sitting on the floor. His thoughts are dangerously close to a prayer.
The wing laid across him twitches slightly; rises and lowers. It feels a lot like a hug.
‘Please can I go home?...Please can I go home?’