Chapter Text
Crowley is not fond of Christmas, for several reasons.
For one thing, there are bound to be even more hordes of pedestrians and cars on the road than normal. Not that this in fact impedes his ability to do ninety miles per hour through central London in the least; but he is offended nonetheless. He also hates the cold, and is affronted that the humans should have chosen to celebrate their most important holiday in the winter-time, meaning a busy time for him with work from Below just when he would prefer to be sleeping. Besides, as someone who spent quite a lot of time with the Son of God back in the day, Crowley is vicariously offended that the humans don’t even have the courtesy to celebrate the Son’s birthday on the correct date. To top it all off, he finds that there are deep-seated theological problems with the notion that Someone would send Her child into the world for the express purpose of living a difficult life and dying an exceedingly painful death. However redemptive the knock-on consequences. He also doesn’t like shopping, and Christmas means lots of it—as he has discovered in the ten years since moving into the bookshop shortly after the Not-pocalypse.
Aziraphale, of course, loves the Christmas season. He loves poking about in odd shops for the perfect Christmas present for a friend (although he has studiously avoided the big department stores since Crowley informed him sometime in 1998 that department stores were one of theirs) (1). He loves the flocks of re-united families wandering the streets, chattering and laughing and eating sweets with their noses red from cold, the carollers, the church services (Crowley goes to these too, in snake form, tucked under Aziraphale’s shirt. This is how, one memorable Christmas morn, the rather judgmental pastor of a little church in Surrey, having preached a rather judgmental sermon, raised his head from the concluding prayer to find a small but quite frightening snake hissing at him from the Christmas tree (2) ). He loves remembering that first Christmas (never mind that it was the wrong date): the two young parents with their arms encircling the child, who was to them in that moment not the Son of God, too great to understand, but something much smaller-seeming, and fully their own. And the birthdays since then—Aziraphale had kept an eye on the child, of course, he was the Messiah, watching the little family celebrations, clapping his hands and dancing silently in glee when he learned that Miriam was expecting again; no need to cast secret blessings on that family, which brimmed over with love from the start. Aziraphale has tried to explain the joy of witnessing the early years to Crowley, who saw only those briefer, sadder years of the Son’s ministry and death; but he has found that saying anything about it tends to put Crowley in a bad mood. It was after one such conversation that the little church in Surrey acquired its unexpected, snakey Christmas tree ornament.
Since that incident, and the ensuing fallout, Aziraphale and Crowley have talked no further about Christmas, and have each made themselves quite uncomfortable every year in an attempt to be accommodating. Crowley insists on accompanying Aziraphale shopping, patiently holding baskets and bags while Aziraphale runs about excitedly. Aziraphale goes to only one Christmas service, instead of his usual three, and afterwards scrolls through Christmas movies on Netflix, glancing anxiously back and forth between Crowley and the TV screen.(3) Both secretly hate how conciliatory the other is being. Crowley feels that Aziraphale’s normally radiant Christmas joy has been dampened, but Aziraphale insists that nothing is wrong. Aziraphale feels that Crowley is being too polite, tense even, for most of December, but has no idea how to talk to him about it. This remains the status quo for nearly seven years.
Until, one particularly cold, crisp December 1st, Aziraphale comes to a Decision. This silent, unhappy standoff is Unacceptable, and it is largely his own fault. It is his job, as messenger of the light and (ex?)-Principality, and as the being who loves Crowley more than anyone else in the world, to ensure that Crowley is able to enjoy Christmas. This is not to be achieved through Crowley forcing himself to do things he does not want to do (like shopping), or through theological or emotional argument (Aziraphale does not want a repeat of the snake/tree incident).
No, this year Aziraphale is going to win Crowley through love. He’s going to shower him in it. For each of the thirty-one days of December, he is going to pick out something special for himself and Crowley to do together. Things which—he fervently hopes—Crowley will enjoy. Aziraphale is determined that this Christmas will be a time which brings him and Crowley closer together, rather than pulling them apart.
What better place to start, he thinks, than ice skating?
(1) This is not, in fact, the case. Department stores were the creation neither of Heaven nor Hell, but of several particularly enterprising and unscrupulous businessmen. Crowley had simply been having a Very Bad Day in 1998, and when Crowley was having a Very Bad Day, he sometimes had a tendency to try and spoil it for other people as well. Aziraphale was a particularly easy target, but the sad, deflated look he gave on such occasions (even his fluffy hair seeming to sag in defeat) was always so heart-rending that Crowley, instantly regretful, would invariably do everything he could to fix the situation, from buying the angel cocoa to performing a few clandestine miracles.
(2) Conveniently constructed, in this case, so as to be quite close to the pulpit.
(3) The TV is an import from Crowley’s flat. The Netflix is actually a Crowley invention. He does not tell Aziraphale this.