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The sun is at the perfect height to blind Aziraphale as he walks through the streets of Tyre in Phoenicia. It falls between the buildings and into his eyes, and he raises a hand to shield his face.
It’s a lovely day despite the angle of the sun, warm and breezy, and there are still people about selling their final wares for the day or setting up for an evening of entertainment. As he crosses into the market, he steps around a group of boisterous young men who are clearly ready for a longer evening in companionable company. They are loud and excited and Aziraphale feels tired just looking at them; he wants nothing more than to go home. It has been a long day, and he has spent the last week resolving bad blood between two of the local merchants. He deserves a break; there is a jug or two of wine with his name on it.
Aziraphale spends most evenings similarly these days, give or take the wine. Oftentimes he finds himself absorbed in a scroll through all hours of the night, sitting at his desk making notations or curled in bed with a cup in hand. This is his personal preference, and not for a lack of entertainment in the city; there are plenty of establishments which offer food or drink or entertainment—and he’d patronized them all when he’d first arrived here. But after nearly six decades, eating on his own and making fleeting acquaintances had grown somewhat stale.
Aziraphale has work to do, and once he’s done it, there’s no more need to mingle. And it is Good work. Busy work, which takes up most of his hours. It’s why he’s here, after all, and not still in Egypt with all he’d left behind. Aziraphale doesn’t often let himself dwell anymore on what he’d left behind. Things like familiar haunts, a beautiful home, or companionship.
...But it is Good work, why he’s here, and even once he’s finished with his tasks he can usually manage to find some other way to chip in. Why, just the other day he’d stopped on his way home to help one of his neighbors pack their wares up in the market, and then he’d bumped into a familiar face with a gaggle of children and offered to carry one of the little ones home—after all, the poor woman’s arms were very full. And after that, once he’d set off on his way again to his own home, he’d run into two lads scuffling in the street, and, being someone who was both wiser and significantly older, he’d naturally had to step in and help them resolve their differences in a more civilized way. And by then the moon had already risen and then fallen again in the sky, and it had just made more sense, really, to skip going home all together and instead go into the market and help set up for the day. In any case, Aziraphale keeps himself busy.
Making his way towards the other end of the market, the angel pauses to allow a cluster of people to pass in front of him, then ducks around them with murmured apologies and pleasantries. He steps into the square, lively and loud and full of bustling crowds, and stops. For the length of a heartbeat, he almost isn’t sure what has caught his attention. Then he looks again, and his breath catches in his throat.
Aziraphale would recognize the figure standing beside the glassmaker anywhere. They’re illuminated by a slant of colored light where the sun shines through a display of glass vases, and they’re dressed in unfamiliar clothes, but even after all this time, he doesn’t think that he’d ever be able not to recognize Crowley.
The demon does look different though; different than he had in Memphis. His hair is shorter, no longer worn in long braids that fall across his bare back and sway as he walks. No, he’d changed to suit the fashions, as one needs to do when one travels great distances. Here in Phoenicia, men wear long tunics rather than linen skirts which bare their chests and shoulders to the sun. And hair is cut to the shoulders and pulled back.
Still, it strikes Aziraphale how the shape of Crowley’s face is just the same, from the slant of his nose to the way the sun casts shadows on those sharp cheekbones of his. And his posture is just as sleek and inviting as ever.
Crowley has always been a languid creature, casual in walk and manner and in the way he crowds into a person’s space and into their life as if it is the most natural thing in the world. As if it’s not an aberration.
Aziraphale runs his eyes over Crowley again, taking in the cut of his tunics—very modern, a mix of patterns favored by the youth with the cut of the collar to make it obvious that the wearer is of high status—it is very Crowley, for all that Aziraphale is still used to thinking of Crowley in other fashions. Crowley always has been keen to look the part.
Standing stock still with the sun warming the side of his face, Aziraphale wonders how long the demon has been out of Egypt for; how long he had stayed there after Aziraphale had left. Decades, likely; they’d both put down roots in Memphis, and surely it was unrealistic to imagine that he had left once Aziraphale wasn’t there—unrealistic and ridiculous, and Aziraphale really ought to push the thought aside. Crowley has never let others dictate his actions, so why would he allow Aziraphale the privilege? They are nothing to each other, after all—you can hardly count your opponent as your friend, no matter how long you've known them. And no amount of shared meals, or bottles of wine, or long talks through the night can change a thing like that. And he hasn’t even seen Crowley in decades, anyway.
Aziraphale takes a breath, clutching at the ornately dyed fabric of his tunics. Still, he should go and talk to him. That would be the polite thing to do, after so long. Just go over and say hello, simple as that. But it’s hard to take that first step, somehow. The people moving around him make it look so easy.
He tells himself he needn’t dither; it is just Crowley. Crowley, who looks so different; Crowley, who he hasn’t seen in decades; Crowley, who has refractions of colored light from the glassware stall falling across his skin in an array of beautiful blues and greens and golds. Crowley, who Aziraphale could stand here and drink in the sight of for years, if only the world would pause for him.
Aziraphale takes another breath and straightens his shoulders. He just needs to move; to cross the market and reinsert himself into Crowley’s life. To speak to perhaps the only being in the world who actually knows him.
But before Aziraphale can do more than shift his foot in the dirt, Crowley looks up. The moment that he catches sight of Aziraphale is obvious, because his face blanks for the briefest, most agonizing moment as their eyes lock. And then it splits into a grin.
Intrinsically, the demon’s corporation is all angles, sharp lines and dark hair and gleaming white teeth. And yet somehow he can change all of that with an expression. He smiles and his entire face softens; his eyes crinkle and his brow smoothes out. What is harsh becomes welcoming; what is intimidating becomes charming.
Aziraphale can’t breathe. It’s been so long since he’s seen that smile.
In what feels like space of a heartbeat, Crowley has abandoned his conversation with the glassmaker and crossed the market to Aziraphale’s side.
“Aziraphale,” he says, low and soft, and Aziraphale can feel his corporation’s lips want to tremble. Oh, that voice: the familiar lilt of it, the dark drawl; so easy, so cajoling, so comfortable. A demon’s voice should not be so comfortable.
“You’re here!” Crowley says. His yellow eyes crinkle at the corners with the magnitude of his grin, and Aziraphale feels as though he has been bludgeoned on the head.
“I’m where?” he manages, and Crowley laughs.
“In Tyre! In Phoenicia!” Crowley throws out his arms and rocks back on his heels, dragging his eyes over Aziraphale. Aziraphale feels terribly exposed despite the layers that he’s wearing, despite that they’re far more than he’d ever donned in Egypt. And Crowley makes it so much worse when he clasps the angel’s upper arms in his hands and the warmth of his touch seeps in through the fabric. “You look good, angel,” he says, voice soft, and Aziraphale swallows.
“I—I—thank you,” he says, blinking rapidly. He hasn’t been held like this...been held at all, really, in...well, he honestly can’t remember. He feels momentarily wounded by the thought. Crowley is the demon, and Aziraphale is the angel; of the two of them, Aziraphale should be the one who is kind and giving and approachable, and Crowley should be the one who is standoffish. Somehow it hasn’t worked out that way, however.
Crowley’s fingers tense and then release Aziraphale’s arms, and his hands drop as swiftly to his sides as they had risen. Aziraphale can still feel their phantom touch.
“You look good as well,” he says awkwardly, his eyes darting from Crowley’s face to their surroundings in the market; for all that it had been impossible to look away from Crowley earlier, it’s now nearly as difficult to hold his gaze.
“Thanks,” Crowley says, folding his arms over his chest. A warm breeze buffets them both, rippling their tunics about their ankles and scattering Crowley’s dark hair about his face. Aziraphale bites his lip. There are...two ways that this can go, now: either he and Crowley drop things here, stilted, and go their separate ways, possibly bumping into each other over the next several days and slowly easing back into whatever thing they’d had in Egypt...and Aziraphale goes back to his home, alone with his thoughts and his wine....or, Aziraphale can invite Crowley back with him, and damn the awkward pauses and uncomfortable glances, because...because he doesn’t want to be alone. He’s tired of being alone.
Aziraphale swallows.
“I was just on my way home,” he says. “I was planning on a quiet night, but I have some good wine, and there’s enough for two…?” He allows the sentence to trail off hopefully; Crowley can take it or leave it, it’s in his court now.
“Well, you know me,” says Crowley, smiling easily, “I’m always fond of a good wine.”
“Wonderful,” Aziraphale breathes, and something in his chest loosens even as his hands twine themselves together anxiously. “I live just this way. I’m...I’m set up above my workspace; I’m a scribe, these days, when I’m not off performing miracles! The writing system is quite efficient here. Did you know it’s taken off as far as Athens? That’s what the merchants tell me, anyway.”
He leads the way out of the market and down familiar streets, and Crowley follows at his side. It’s a familiar sensation having Crowley with him, for all that it’s also strange after so long; they fall easily back into the dynamic that they’d had before Aziraphale had left.
The two of them would often take walks in the evening when they were in Memphis, whiling away the time talking about unimportant things or nothing at all. It feels almost like that now, although the two of them paint a very different picture here than they had back then.
In Aziraphale’s memory, Egypt is made of warm weather, and sunshine, and lazy, delectable afternoons. On afternoons in Egypt, the light of the setting sun would cast Crowley’s bare back in a warm glow, settling shadows along the ridge of his spine and the dips of his shoulders. In the evenings they’d walk along the riverbank, and the warm orange of the sunset would paint the demon the color of fire. His eyes had always seemed brightest then, on those evenings with the sun shining through them: less yellow; more golden. Their shadows would stretch in front of them, then: Aziraphale straight-backed but also more relaxed than he’d ever really allowed himself to be before, and Crowley with that soft slouch to his posture, both shadows trailing steadily across the ground until they became shapeless things in the dusk, indistinguishable from each other. It isn’t like that now.
“So, you like it here?” says Crowley, and Aziraphale is jolted back to the present: to the sun in their eyes and the wooden buildings all around them.
“Do I?” Aziraphale murmurs. Does he like it here? He likes...some of the people, he supposes. And he enjoys some of the things he’s done; he’s certainly never been so productive. But he’s also never really found himself glad that he is here. “I don’t know, it’s...home now.”
“Not as nice as Memphis?” Crowley chuckles, and Aziraphale feels his expression sour.
“No,” he wants to spit, “Obviously nothing is as good as Memphis.” But he doesn’t. Instead he looks at Crowley’s face, taking in the wistful cant to his features. Aziraphale sighs.
“There are things that I like better,” he admits. “The writing system is marvelous, as I’ve said. And I enjoy the variety of dyes that are available for clothes, as well as the glasswork they make. There’s fine artistry. But on the whole...well...no. At least it isn’t to me.”
“Oh,” says Crowley.
“Yes,” says Aziraphale. And then they stop, because they’ve arrived.
Aziraphale’s home, as he’d said, is above his place of work. It’s small compared to the buildings on either side of it, and although it has two stories, each only contains two rooms.
“It’s not much,” Aziraphale says, opening the door, and they step inside. “I inherited it from someone else, you see. He’d run the place before me, but he was getting up in years and moved south to live with his son. Er.”
“Huh,” says Crowley, and Aziraphale watches the demon’s eyes rove over the room; he wonders if Crowley is comparing it to the home he’d had in Egypt. This one certainly isn’t as lavish.
The interior of the ground floor contains what amounts to an office, with a desk and two chairs. There are several other tables, all strewn with scrolls and books and writing implements. There’s a scroll open on the desk that Aziraphale is in the midst of making a copy of, and one of the chairs contains a satchel that he’d brought to the market last week. He hasn’t had company in a while and isn’t really looking for business either.
Crowley walks over to the desk to look at the scroll, and Aziraphale makes his way straight through to the kitchen for the wine. It’s strange, he thinks, lingering in the doorway with the jugs in his hands and watching Crowley poke around when he doesn’t think Aziraphale can see him; it’s strange to have him here in Aziraphale’s space and have him not already be intimately familiar with the setting; he really is a terrible angel, isn’t he?
Heaving a breath, Aziraphale returns to Crowley’s side.
“Not much space to sit and drink,” the demon says. One of his eyebrows is crooked up above his yellow eyes.
“No,” agrees Aziraphale. “We’ll be going upstairs. That’s where I have all the good furniture.”
“Keeping it down here would encourage people to stay?”
Crowley takes one of the wine jugs from the angel and follows him to the staircase.
“Quite,” Aziraphale admits, unashamed. If there was ever a being who has no room to judge Aziraphale’s virtue, it is Crowley.
The rooms upstairs are more dimly lit than the office. The windows are angled differently and the sun has sunk lower on the horizon, down behind the rooftops of the neighboring houses. Aziraphale sets his jug down on the bed that takes up most of the space, and goes to light the oil lamps around the room. By the time he finishes and the room is cast in a warmer glow, Crowley has already settled down on the bed and opened one of the jugs. He’s propped up on Aziraphale’s pillows, long legs stretched in front of him and crossed at the ankles. Aziraphale’s heart gives a weighty thump.
“S—sorry,” he says, crossing the wooden floor to the bed and perching himself lightly beside the demon, “It’s a bit gloomy up here. I don’t usually notice, what with spending my time reading, mostly.”
“S’nothing to apologize for, angel,” Crowley says, passing Aziraphale the open bottle. Aziraphale takes a long, lingering sip and settles himself more comfortably amongst the pillows. He hands it back.
“So then,” he says, “I didn’t ask. But what’s brought you this way, Crowley? Did you leave Egypt recently?”
Crowley scoffs, taking another drink and then passing the jug back.
“Recently? Nah, I’ve been out of Egypt almost as long as you have.” He runs a hand through his hair. “Sold the boat, caught a ride up to Greece—have you been? The climate’s nice. Went to Athens, and Crete, an’ Rhodes. Crete was really something. Then I crossed paths with some Phoenician merchants, and ended up here. Remembered you’d gone out this way, so I figured that there must be something here worth seeing.”
Aziraphale had been running his fingers along the cool rim of the bottle as Crowley spoke. He lifts it to his lips to buy himself time to take that in before he replies.
“So, you’ve just been drifting, then?” he says. “Not here for any mischief?”
“No more than usual,” says Crowley.
“Good.”
“And what about you, angel? Been working miracles? Influencing people towards Good?” He sounds sly, almost taunting, and Aziraphale feels his expression go very tight.
“Yes, actually,” he says stiffly. He doesn’t look at Crowley. “What else would I be doing?”
Crowley blinks at him.
“Reading your scrolls?” he says. “Enjoying the local cuisine, attending whatever entertainment is available? Going—going on walks? That’s what you were doing when we bumped into each other, isn’t it?”
Those are all lovely things of course; the sort of things that Crowley is used to seeing Aziraphale do; used to tempting him into.
“No,” he says, and takes another drink of the wine before pushing it into Crowley’s hands. “I wasn’t. I was on my way home from working, performing acts of kindness. I haven’t…” he looks at the dust on the scroll sitting on his bedside table. “I haven’t been home since two nights ago.”
Crowley scrunches his face up, lowering the bottle from his lips.
“You just got back into the city? You didn’t have to have me over.”
And that would be true, of course, if Aziraphale had in fact left the city.
“No, no,” he says, and then stops. He looks at Crowley, still completely relaxed and sprawled out on top of Aziraphale’s bedspread, looking slightly befuddled. Telling Crowley the whole of it, making him tense, seeing the ease seep out of his posture...that wouldn’t do. “We haven’t seen each other in so long, after all,” he says.
“Mmmm. Okay. Well, it sounds boring anyway, just doing what you’re—well, just working.”
Aziraphale reaches for the bottle, and Crowley hands it to him.
“Well,” says the demon, “tell me about the city, at least. I know you; you can’t have been doing only miracles for sixty years.”
“Ah.” Aziraphale weighs the bottle in his hands, tilting the weight from palm to palm. It’s very nearly empty. He raises it and drinks the last of it, then reaches for the second jug, still on the bed beside him, and hands it to Crowley. “It’s nice here,” he says slowly. “There are the usual: restaurants and taverns; marketplaces; the normal forms of entertainment. People are people no matter where you go, you know that. I...hm...do quite like the seaside here. I sometimes go down at night when there’s no one there and listen to the waves.” And he did, at that, on nights when sitting at his desk alone just didn’t seem enough.
“You liked the river too,” says Crowley, drumming his fingers over the bottle. “You liked to watch the sun on it.”
“I did,” Aziraphale murmurs, reaching for the wine. Crowley watches him drink with half-lidded eyes. They gleam like cut glass in the lamplight.
Neither of them says anything else for a time, simply passing the wine back and forth. Somehow, this silence is warm. Aziraphale tells himself that the burning heat in his chest is from the drink.
Abruptly, Crowley heaves himself up unsteadily on one elbow and leans into Aziraphale’s space. Aziraphale flinches back and stares into the demon’s squinted eyes.
“You look the same,” Crowley says somewhat hoarsely, and Aziraphale can smell the wine on his breath. “I’ve been trying to spot a difference all evening, but other than the clothes, you haven’t changed at all, have you? Just kept on going like you always have… Tha’s really…” he shakes his head and slumps back down onto the pillows. His forearm falls against Aziraphale’s thigh. “It’s like nothing ever—ever gets to you, angel. You’re just—just the same.” He flings an arm over his eyes and heaves a sigh, and Aziraphale bites his lip. He takes another drink from the bottle and listens to the sound of Crowley breathing. His eyes rove over the little bedroom, over the piles of dusty scrolls and the tables with their softly glowing oil lamps. He has so many scrolls full of fascinating tales and beautiful scripts, and at the heart of them all is humanity. Humanity and their intricate, intense lives, always lived to the fullest while they’re here—human beings are always so intent on making their mark upon the world and upon each other, even if it’s only by leaving words behind; even if it’s only by being known once they’re no longer there themselves. Aziraphale sighs. It’s dark outside the window—and how had Aziraphale not noticed the time passing? The moon is a ghostly sliver amongst the stars, and the city streets are quiet. It must be late. He takes a breath, and looks down at Crowley.
“Crowley—” he says, and then stops. How long had Aziraphale fallen away into his thoughts? It must have been more time than he had thought, muddled by the wine as he is, because Crowley is asleep. His arm is still flung over his face, and his lips are gently parted. As Aziraphale watches, he lets out a soft huff of breath and the fingers of his hand curl slightly. The light of the oil lamps is gentle, and everything about the demon is soft, relaxed and unguarded—even here in Aziraphale’s home, even while Aziraphale himself is painfully stiff.
Aziraphale has seen Crowley asleep before, usually after nights of drinking such as this one. Crowley has always been careless in Aziraphale’s presence, almost an antithesis to the show he puts on in public; around others he puts so much effort into appearing suave, even though to anyone who knows him, it’s clearly a farce (not that anyone really does know him, other than perhaps Aziraphale himself—but surely that’s a conceited thing to think). He is always so keen to come across as dashing—as the type of human that other humans want to be. Yet to Aziraphale, he has never been more fetching than when he is like this: his edges smoothed, all pretenses dropped. It has been so terribly long since the angel has seen him this way. So many years.
It should feel better, now, having Crowley beside him, but instead Aziraphale only feels the weight of time; now that Crowley isn’t awake, isn’t talking to him, all Aziraphale can think of is the cold. He has been so cold, so worn thin, that it hurts.
Aziraphale breathes a shuddering sigh and clenches shut his eyes.
He had been doing so well before Crowley had turned up again; he had nearly convinced himself that there was nothing lacking; that the way things were was right. And now that the demon is back again, all of that has shattered at his feet like broken, cutting shards of glass. It’s more painful than he’d expected.
If there is a cure for this terrible, aching longing within him, then Aziraphale wishes that someone would share the secret. He is tired of feeling hollowed out and bleeding when there’s no injury there to heal.
Please, he thinks, looking down at Crowley, sprawled unknowing upon the bed, give me some material to work with; give him some wrong that he can right, some hurt to comfort. Give him someone to hold who will not judge him for all his weaknesses, but help him through them.
Crowley mumbles slightly in his sleep and his arm slips away from over his eyes. Here on Aziraphale’s bed, on Aziraphale’s blankets, with Aziraphale’s wine on his breath, he somehow feels so far away; a specter that the angel cannot touch; a mirage that would shatter under the slightest brush of a finger. Aziraphale finds himself curling in on himself with the remainder of the wine, nearly empty, cradled to his chest. He has been so terribly tired as of late; so terribly cold. His hands will brush another’s in the marketplace and he will restrain the urge to grasp the warm palm between his own just to feel present and known. The only one who has ever known him is Crowley. Crowley, who doesn’t judge him, not really, when he strays from the path—not that Aziraphale would ever admit to straying. He’s very good at seeming…good. Kind, approachable, a steady head on his shoulders; he has the act perfected to such an extent that it almost feels more like reality than the selfish cravings which he hides away.
A wind blows through the window, cool enough in the night to send goose bumps crawling up his arms—and Crowley’s too, Aziraphale can see in the lamp light. The demon is so close, after all; so very near, after so long.
Aziraphale sets down his wine on the bedside table, nudging aside a stack of scrolls, and then reaches over Crowley for the edge of the blanket. He drapes the loose end over the demon, and his thumb brushes against Crowley’s jaw. Warm. He’s warm. He doesn’t shatter like glass or drift apart like smoke under Aziraphale’s touch, and Aziraphale is filled with that burning again. He wants to reach out; to hold Crowley, to wrap him in this silly little blanket as if it could wall out the rest of the world. And even more than that, he wants to be held. Aziraphale pushes that thought away. Bad enough to want to…to hug the enemy, but at least that can be written off as—as good will, or some such. Charity; kindness. No, it’s the wanting of comfort which is the sin. The weakness that Aziraphale cannot abide. So he pushes it away, even as he can’t help but imagine a warm palm on his face, so soft against his cheek; a tender touch to his hair; gentle lips that do not take, but give and give until this pit within Aziraphale might finally be filled, and then no more; no more, even as Aziraphale gives back and yet doesn’t feel as if he’s giving up anything at all, he only feels lighter—oh.
How Aziraphale aches not to feel heavy.
He drops the corner of the blanket like a hot stone. He pulls back.
Aziraphale retreats to the edge of the bed and watches the glimmer of the lamp light on Crowley’s hair, the warm orange and yellow that ripples over his skin. He watches the flutter of his lashes, the slow rise and fall of his chest. He drinks the rest of his wine, though it tastes sour and stale.
He ought to pick up one of the scrolls; he tells himself that he should want to pick up one of the scrolls; they’re his passion, after all. But all he can bring himself to do is glance at where they sit on the table before his gaze crawls back to Crowley.
Outside, the moon sinks below the horizon and the sky begins to lighten to gray. There are heavy clouds gathering which dull the coming morning’s glow, dampening it to something heavy and dreary, for all that it is less dark than the night. Still, even in the gloom, Crowley steals his undivided attention. Shadows crawl across his face as the room goes from the yellow of the lamps to gray with the dawn. He looks soft, in the way that cotton looks soft on a breezy day; in the way of a heavy blanket brought out of storage, still cool to the touch but comforting, just waiting to be warmed.
Aziraphale twists his fingers together until the knuckles go white.
Beside him, Crowley shifts. He breathes a deeper breath, a long inhale and exhale, and his head turns on the pillow until his nose is pressed rather uncomfortably into the bedding. He snuffles slightly; groans; cracks an eye open and then closes it.
“G’morning, angel,” he mumbles around a small yawn, and Aziraphale is grateful that Crowley’s eyes are still closed. Aziraphale closes his own eyes, takes a breath, and composes himself.
“Good morning,” he says quietly. “It looks like it’s going to be a dreary one. Already smells like rain.”
“Ugh,” says Crowley, burrowing deeper into Aziraphale’s pillow, “maybe I should just stay in bed.” Then what he’s said seems to catch up with him and his eyes shoot open. “Oh! Shit.” His face is pale. “Aziraphale, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to fall asleep—in your bed—agh—I didn’t think—I never fall asleep in unfamiliar places—so—!”
Aziraphale cuts him off. His voice sounds slightly tense, but he hopes that Crowley doesn’t notice or read too much into it.
“It’s fine, dear boy. I don’t mind. Besides, in Egypt….”
“Yeah,” Crowley says, finally hauling himself upright. The folded over blanket slips off of him, and he looks down at it. “But Egypt was a long time ago. And I thought—I mean, you left—and. And.”
His eyes dart to Aziraphale’s and then away again, and he looks so troubled that Aziraphale just can’t help himself—what sort of angel would he be if he could help himself in front of someone in need—and he reaches out to take Crowley’s hands in his. They’re warm, and lightly calloused. He has a scar on one knuckle that he cut on Aziraphale’s tooth what must be a thousand years ago now. It was a different time. His fingers clench around the angel’s, holding just as tightly to Aziraphale as Aziraphale has gripped onto Crowley.
“I didn’t leave Egypt because I wanted to,” Aziraphale says, looking up from their hands to Crowley’s face, and watches the realization slide over it.
“You didn’t,” echoes Crowley. “You didn’t leave because—because of—” He swallows. “Oh.”
“Yes,” says Aziraphale. He looks down at their hands again, because they really have been holding on for longer than comfort would necessitate, but he cannot bring himself to let go. And neither, it seems, can Crowley.
“Oh,” he says again, and his hands are warm and his smile is warmer still, and Aziraphale is still aching, but somehow he thinks that he can live with it.