Work Text:
Crowley has been trying to tempt Aziraphale into taking a nap for the last four thousand years, and it takes a little more than two weeks after the Armageddon-that-wasn’t before Aziraphale finally caves in.
Crowley can feel it when it happens; the moment he knows he’s backed Aziraphale into a corner with his own lame arguments. “Really, angel?” he says while watching Aziraphale carry stacks of books across the shop in an attempt to keep his hands full. “Do tell me what’s keeping you busy these days? No Heaven demanding reports. Maybe you are writing them out of pure boredom.”
“I am not bored.” Dust rises from the desk and causes Aziraphale to wrinkle his nose as he lets go of the books. “I am enjoying our new freedom, actually. But it does leave one’s hands rather empty, doesn’t it?”
Aziraphale stares at his own palms curiously, twisting them, and before Crowley can even be hit by the thought of reaching out and taking a hold of them, his mouth continues the temptations, “Maybe you now have the time to try something new.”
The angel looks up at him, eyes round and wide and curious.
Good.
“Oh?”
The bookshop doesn’t have a bed which forces them to head to Crowley’s apartment. Now when Aziraphale has already seen the place, Crowley is keener on letting him inside, though he could do without the angel’s comments regarding his plants, throne, and statue (“They are wrestling.”).
Aziraphale is surprisingly willing to follow Crowley to his bed, and the demon bites his own tongue to avoid commenting on it.
“What was your excuse again, angel?” he asks instead. “Do I remember correctly that you said ‘sleeping is a waste of time’ when I suggested a quick nap after the plagues?”
“Tempted,” Aziraphale corrects him. “And Heaven was having a rather strict schedule back then, as you recall.”
“Ah. So the ‘waste of time’ is Gabriel’s wording, then?” Crowley can see that he’s hit a sore spot; Aziraphale doesn’t wince but his eyes dart away from Crowley for just a second. He doesn’t regret his words, but Crowley knows they are no longer needed now when Aziraphale is already cutting his ties to Heaven. “Doesn’t matter. We do have all the time in the world, now. At least, until we don’t.”
“I’d imagine you’re right about that,” Aziraphale says with a smile and the unspoken word ‘eternity’ lingers in the air. “Well, it would be the perfect time to find a new hobby.”
“Self-preservation is not a hobby, Aziraphale.”
While their bodies might not need sleep, exhaustion doesn’t escape them. Crowley prefers the daily rest; after a week without sleep, the headache begins to set in. The days surrounding Armageddon had been particularly bad.
He wonders how Aziraphale made it through the millennia with his attitude towards sleep. He likes to believe the angels go to Heaven to recharge in some heavenly light like a solar cell. Heaven must be all about renewable energy.
“It should be easy, then,” the angel says, still smiling.
“Of course. Children do it. Never enough, but they do it.”
Aziraphale takes off his shoes because crawling into Crowley’s queen-sized bed. Crowley doesn’t even know why he for the briefest moment thought Aziraphale would actually undress himself (when was the last time he’d seen Aziraphale unbutton anything? The angel has been stuck in a chronic state of buttoned-up) and he blinks as Aziraphale turns to lie on his back.
“Do you have a favorite position?”
“Hghn,” says Crowley.
“This one is the most common, yes?” Aziraphale blinks up at him. His arms are resting on his stomach, head placed perfectly in the middle of the pillow, ankles pressed against one another. “You must tell me if I’m doing anything wrong.”
“You’re doing great, angel. The next part is the hardest one. Close your eyes and do nothing.”
“I’m not unfamiliar with the concept. It just hasn’t appeared pleasant before.”
“What about now? You have to admit you are at least curious.”
“You tempted me towards worse things,” Aziraphale says kindly. His fingers gently pat the black bedding. “And I admit, this is comfortable.”
Crowley can see it in his expression where the warm smile reveals just how pleased Aziraphale is at the moment. It’s the same kind of satisfaction that will pull at the corner of his lips when served a particularly good cake or when he gets his hand on a new, rare book.
“Thinking about getting one for the bookshop?”
“I don’t think it’d fit.” The angel frowns but hasn’t exactly rejected the idea. “I could choose something smaller than yours, though.”
“It’d ruin the vibe,” Crowley says and crawls on top of the bed until he can collapse right next to the angel who turns his head just slightly to watch him. Crowley, a practiced sleeper, lets his long limbs sprawl across the bedding. His heel brushes against Aziraphale’s toes, hidden beneath the sock, and no one comments on it.
Aziraphale has closed his eyes now, facing the ceiling. His breathing has slowed into a steady pattern, and Crowley loathes to admit that the angel is doing better at this than expected. He doesn’t need his help at all.
“Well,” Aziraphale says. “Sweet dreams.”
“G’night, angel.”
Crowley closes his eyes as well. There are only a few inches between them, and he can feel the heat from Aziraphale (less to do with angels being hot, and more to do with Crowley being cold) and hear the deep breaths. With his imagination, he can picture Aziraphale’s chest rising and falling, at peace now when there’s no threat, no commands from above or below, just rising and falling and-
It stops.
Crowley lunges upwards, hovering above the angel who’s grown completely still. He’s like a statue – pureness and holiness and softness etched into perfect marble, unmoving.
The demon lets out a panicked hiss, and Aziraphale opens his eyes, staring directly into his face.
“You’re sssleeping – not playing dead,” Crowley says a bit too stiffly. This shouldn’t be a big deal, but while he knows the lack of air isn’t deadly for them, it isn’t pleasant to see Aziraphale so corpse-like. It brings back bad memories. Better than smoke, though. Smoke and flames. But this is his flat, safe and locked up behind new doors, and Aziraphale is just being an idiot. Nothing new under the sun. Except for the doors. “Quit imitating a mummy, start imitating me.”
Crowley lies back down, closer to the angel this time and on his side.
Aziraphale rolls over as well to mirror him and rests his head on the top of his hand. “I’m good at that,” he says, sounding extraordinary content with himself.
Like this, their stares find each other so easily. Crowley’s eyes remain hidden behind the darkened glass, but he cannot help but wonder if Aziraphale can see them anyway due to the intensity of his stare and the sudden closeness. He doesn’t blink, however.
In fact, he doesn’t even close his eyes. This time, instead, he waits and watches as Aziraphale repeats the same procedure as before. Their shared glance breaks when Aziraphale’s eyelids fall ever so slowly. It takes a while, but Crowley sees the moment sleep gets a hold of the angel for the first time since… since… Maybe it’s just the first time. If the nap caused by Hastur’s crowbar doesn’t count.
No matter what, it’s the first time Crowley gets to see the angel asleep. Now he’s the one unbreathing as Aziraphale’s face goes slack. It’s not unnerving as the still chest had been. Instead, the lack of expression somehow conveys more emotion than Crowley has been allowed to see before.
Aziraphale is a liar despite his angelic nature. He’s kept things from Heaven and from Crowley. His eyes, however, are bad liars, and Crowley has lost count of too many times he’s seen Aziraphale’s internal fight mirrored in them. But now, Aziraphale cannot even attempt to hide his emotions. There is nothing holding him back, nothing to fret about it.
It eases the lines around his mouth, the wrinkles near the eyebrows. It smoothens out the face, making it softer, and how could anyone hate that, the softness?
His golden eyes follow the curves of Aziraphale’s cheek, down towards his mouth that carries just the ghost of a smile, even in his sleep. Maybe that makes it more true. No reason to hide it.
Aziraphale’s nose twitches just then, and Crowley fears it’s a nightmare disturbing the peace (Crowley has too much experience when it comes to that), but then the dimples appear, and next comes a slow exhale.
Ah. A good dream, then.
Crowley bloody hopes so. If Aziraphale suffers a night terror, he can’t imagine he’ll get the angel to take another shot at sleeping for the next hundred years, at least. And the risk remains. Crowley is still haunted by the memory of hellfire, and he wonders if Aziraphale brought any ghosts back with him from Hell.
But for now, the angel sleeps – because he deserves to, because he can, because it’s something he’s been denied, and it’s something Crowley can and will give him. The demon is so close to him now, his breathing pulls at Aziraphale’s curls.
Crowley might be the original tempter, but Aziraphale deserves that title for his blond curls. Who is not tempted to reach out and pat the hair? Who doesn’t want to know if it feels like it looks – like a lamb. There’s a bitter joke in there, somewhere, about a lamb and a wolf, well, snake.
Crowley might have thought more about that, but he is disturbed by a ray of sunlight that dares to land on the angel’s face. Aziraphale blinks awake, and Crowley pulls back so quickly, he almost falls out of the bed. He turns his head towards the window and sees that it’s morning. When did that happen?
“How long did we sleep?” Aziraphale asks him in the middle of a yawn.
“Ngk,” says Crowley because Aziraphale’s question assumes there’s a ‘we’ – that Crowley spent the night sleeping soundly next to him in the bed instead of staring at Aziraphale’s peaceful face through the entire ordeal. This, however, should be blamed on Aziraphale’s face and its tendency to twitch ever so slightly during particularly nice dreams. Crowley is completely innocent in this temptation.
Aziraphale is sitting up now, stretching his arms above his head. “Crowley, you promised this wouldn’t take a decade,” he whines, staring down at Crowley. It’d been a big fear, apparently. Missing too much time even though they have eternity.
True, Crowley may have slept a century away once, but why use that escape when you have good company?
“It was just a night. Calm down before you lose a feather.”
“Oh,” Aziraphale says and the change is immediate. His features soften, not enough to beat his unconscious expression, but enough to let pure happiness seep through. “It was very nice,” the angel admits. His hand is placed on top of Crowley’s to prove his genuineness. “We should do it again. I- I don’t think I’ve learned everything yet. You must teach me the rest.”
Crowley nods, suddenly feeling tired. Not enough to ruin the day, not at all, but enough to serve as a reminder of how he stayed awake last night. Not that he regrets it the slightest.
“Did you have a nice dream?” Aziraphale asks him, letting himself be dragged down to the bed again.
“Mhmm,” Crowley mutters into his pillow. “Reality beats it.”