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It’s a newfound tradition of theirs, this going to the pictures lark. Just like their nights dining out, this has a similar charade, with them pretending to worry whether there’ll be any spaces left, before finding the exact same two seats reserved as always. But it isn’t watching the film that Aziraphale treasures, not really—it’s what comes after. He savours the stroll back to the Bentley, where the edges of the world are softened, tinted rose by the reassurances of fiction. The certainty of a happy ending.
Aziraphale hums absent-mindedly as they both follow the crowd out of the cinema, his hand rising and falling like he is conducting an invisible orchestra. The music from the closing credits is already in his mental library of melodies. ‘Wherever you’re going, I’m going your way.’
Crowley lingers at the kerb, gives him a teasing side-glance. “Are you humming, angel?”
The corners of Aziraphale’s mouth twitch and threaten to turn into a smile. “I wasn’t doing anything of the sort.”
The benefit of two decades together again has allowed him a certain level of comfort. He knows every step of this dance by rote. “Lift home?” Crowley will ask with pitch-perfect delivery, as if it’s always said off-the-cuff. Aziraphale has joked that it’s fast becoming Crowley’s catchphrase, not that he tires of hearing it, far from it. For one moment, the phrase throws him back to their wartime reunion, with that burning beacon of a church (and the books, the books).
Here it comes, those well-loved words forming from the anticipation in Crowley’s very stance, as he puts one hand in his pocket, fishes out his unneeded car keys and—
He stops. Right there in the middle of the pavement.
It’s a subtle change, but Aziraphale notices before it’s hidden amongst the bustle of the streets, his awareness sharpened from Crowley’s obvious unease. There. The lamplights falter—only once, barely longer than a blink. It’s a signal. The arrival of a malevolent presence that Aziraphale, stomach plummeting, knows is now waiting at a flat in Mayfair.
You told me they don’t know where you live.
A sharp intake of breath, quickly stifled, but Aziraphale hears it all the same. Crowley shifts uncertainly on his feet. He has the subdued appearance of someone who has just been forcibly reminded of the need to tread lightly.
“Um, better not, angel. Got guests, I think.”
Don’t be ridiculous, Aziraphale thinks, panic hurriedly plastered over with irritation. You know your lines; this isn’t how it’s supposed to go. It’s such a bald-faced evasion that part of him wants to argue the point but he wouldn’t dare, not when they could now be watched at any moment.
“Oh, not to worry,” Aziraphale says and steps back, smile firmly in place. (Pitch-perfect delivery.) With more emphasis than necessary, he adds, “Mind how you go.”
He blinks repeatedly, still adjusting to the contrast from the dark picture-house to the stark brightness of the city lights. A final glance over his shoulder, echoes of the film still flickering in front of his eyes, overlaid images competing with his last sight of Crowley. Twin pairs of wide, terrified eyes behind sunglasses.
‘Holly, I love you.’
‘So what.’
‘So what? So plenty!’
Aziraphale looks away. Forces himself to walk on.
‘You know what’s wrong with you, Miss Whoever-you-are? You’re chicken, you’ve got no guts.’
He journeys home alone, a bar of iron squeezed tight around his ribcage.
‘You’re terrified somebody’s gonna stick you in a cage.’
He doesn’t pick up the phone. Just in case. Quite suddenly, he is struck by a thought. He has no idea what he would do if his call wasn’t answered.
‘Well, baby, you’re already in that cage. You built it yourself.’
*
Aziraphale tells himself it’s a fluke. But the routine is broken again—before the film has even ended.
The gunshot on screen prompts a few gasps in the audience, but what Aziraphale flinches at is Crowley rising from his seat.
‘I didn’t believe hard enough.’
‘Loving is enough.’
“What are you doing?” Aziraphale whispers. He can feel eyes on them. People glaring.
Crowley shrugs, but it’s a weak movement, and only draws attention to the tense line of his shoulders. “Well, we already know how it ends,” he says, as soft as a prayer.
‘Not here. They won’t let us be.’
‘Then we’ll get away.’
Aziraphale keeps his gaze fixed on the screen. He pretends that the film is all he is thinking about, the film and nothing more. Not Crowley leaving. Not how the grief-stricken performance makes his breath catch.
‘Well, I can kill, too, because now I have hate!’
Aziraphale pleads silently. Something lighter, next time. Please.
*
Like many unfortunate circumstances, they act like it never happened. And while Aziraphale knows it’s temporary, he can’t help but chase the feeling of relief.
He laughs genuinely at their next viewing when he realises Crowley is taking notes throughout. For the life of him, Aziraphale can’t figure out why; all he can gather from the film is that it involves a magical nanny, and an awful lot of singing.
When he asks, Crowley favours him with a very amused look. “Just observing.”
“Observing what?”
“Mm, more like working on a theory, actually.”
“Don’t be coy, dear.”
“Thought patience was a virtue.”
“Crowley…”
Crowley laughs, gestures at the screen. “Are you honestly going to tell me you don’t have a carpet bag like that, angel?” He grins. “Humans sense one stray miracle and next thing you know, they’ve got divine inspiration.”
“Oh, for—”
“S’hardly subtle! She’s up in the clouds like that, c’mon, being all angelic.”
Aziraphale snorts. “You are not blaming me for this one.”
*
Another musical.
Crowley smirks all the way through ‘Maria.’
Aziraphale eyes him. “You are not blaming me for this one, either.”
“Nah, ‘course not. Wouldn’t dream of it.” Crowley tilts his head in mock consideration. “Think you might have a decade.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Until Upstairs gets their hands on it.”
Aziraphale’s eyes widen. “Oh, don’t.”
“Sorry. It’s catchy, angel. They’ll be all over it like a rash.”
“Not if I erase it from existence,” Aziraphale says darkly. It’s a poor threat, especially when his foot is already tapping at ‘I Have Confidence.’
A few weeks later, Crowley notices the film’s score in the bookshop, playfully pointing out how untidy the stack is. Aziraphale smiles. He does not say he placed them there for Crowley to find.
They will never understand it like we do.
*
Aziraphale’s nails are digging into the armrests. Crowley has been late before, of course. There was a time that he even sidled into his seat with murmured apologies to the other people in the row. It was done with such quiet politeness, his body hunched over slightly, that Aziraphale didn’t have the heart to even joke about the lack of demonic behaviour.
But tonight, the film has been playing for twenty minutes and counting— a sci-fi caper Aziraphale barely cares to follow, not when Crowley is still nowhere to be seen.
He remains paralysed. After all, he weakly tries to reason, it would hardly do to go tearing down the street, making a scene.
They had talked about it before, in terse, scattered conversations across the years, always reluctant, never directly. About what their plan of action would be if either one of them were… were…
Compromised, Crowley had called it, last week, after one too many drinks. Just enough to be truthful. There was a grim set to his mouth. Unease had settled, sour in Aziraphale’s stomach, at the realisation of what he was seeing for the very first time: that this was Crowley admitting defeat.
“Best to carry on as normal, when…” Crowley had waved his hand carelessly. “Don’t want to get ‘em all suspicious, y’know.”
And Aziraphale suddenly found himself longing for that terrible row at St. James’s, back when Crowley said if instead of when. At least then Aziraphale could still hear it, that implicit hope. A fail-safe plan, however dangerous. Over a century later, and Crowley seemed to be accepting the… the most terrible outcome as inevitable.
You have far too much faith in me, Aziraphale did not say, if you think that I could ever carry on as normal after losing you.
Aziraphale leaves the cinema, and manages thirty seconds of carrying on as normal before he’s running for the nearest telephone box.
He pushes the phone against his ear with frantic desperation. And then, he hears something that, in all their years of phone calls together, he has never once heard before. His stomach clenches.
A high-pitched tone, followed by a mechanical voice intoning, “Please hang up and try your call again.”
The phone has been left off the hook. He summons endless change with shaking hands, even pounds a fist furiously against the door when a human outside dares to complain at how long he is taking.
He grits his teeth, does not hear the click. He glances outside, snaps, “Oh, would you kindly fuck off—”
A tinny crow of laughter in his ear, followed by a delighted, “Excuse me?”
Aziraphale covers the receiver. He takes one long, uneven breath. Then, he lowers his hand. “Where on earth have you been, I was…”
Terrified. I’m always terrified when I think you might be—
“Aziraphale, I’m sorry.” And Crowley does sound genuine, quiet in contrition. “Couldn’t tell it was you at first. You’re not on the shop phone, are you? Thought it might be—Well.”
One beat. Two.
“So…” Crowley says.
Oh, Aziraphale recognises that tone, the light and teasing way he draws out the vowel, the way it seems to whisper, Don’t mind me. Don’t worry so, angel. He swallows back more sharp words, anger born out of fear, and simply says, “So, what?”
“Was the film any good?”
Aziraphale forces a choked laugh. “Ah, well, I… I’m afraid I wasn’t giving it due attention.”
“Nope. Don’t believe you. C’mon, angel, give me the gist, at least.”
Aziraphale can feel himself smiling, shaky, but real nonetheless. He hears Crowley’s words—indirect though they may be—for what they truly are. A promise to stay on the line.
*
Aziraphale waits as people leave the theatre, but there’s no familiar silhouette in his peripheral vision. He turns back, and immediately sees why. Crowley is still in his seat, fast asleep. The light from the projector highlights the circles under his eyes.
The screen suddenly resembles a blank canvas as the film stops. Unbidden, it reminds Aziraphale of the blinding light that accompanies blessings. Of—
Oh, God, Aziraphale thinks, and he isn’t even addressing Her. This is no beseeching to a higher power, merely a numb understanding. Acceptance after years of denial and grief. In the burning white light, Crowley doesn’t so much as stir.
Oh, God. I need to give you holy water.
*
Crowley’s ridiculous (charming) bullet-hole stickers are peeling. Aziraphale fixes them—no miracle necessary, just the gentle touch of his thumb. He can sense that the tartan thermos is no longer in the car. Instead, there’s a hum of divine protection around Mayfair.
He had taken a chance tonight, hand brushing across the velvet armrest to reach Crowley. Their fingers touched. Do you feel safer now?
As Crowley reverses onto the kerb, he leans back in the driver’s seat. In overly suave tones, he says, “The name’s Crowley, Anthony Crowley.”
Aziraphale rolls his eyes. “I have half a mind that these ludicrous productions are based on you.”
Crowley tilts his glasses down and winks. “Truth is stranger than fiction,” he says, pitch-perfect delivery.
And Aziraphale knows he means Thank you.