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“This is ridiculous,” Aziraphale says with such conviction that Crowley can’t help but chuckle.
“Oh, angel, it truly isn’t.” He waves a hand between the two of them sitting a bit too close on a bench as swans swim by on the canal.
“Love is such a human concept,” Aziraphale says, wrinkling his nose.
“And…?”
“I am an angel and you are… you.”
Crowley smirks at him, and Aziraphale is absolutely sure that his eyes glimmer with mirth behind his sunglasses.
“What else would you call this between us? We would have died for each other. I wanted to leave the world behind.”
The angel blushes crimson. “But you didn’t. In the end, you stayed.”
Crowley hums and flicks a lint off his jeans. “Because you’re my best friend.”
“Exactly,” Aziraphale says. “But you want to be more than a friend.”
Crowley smiles softly. “It would be stupid to fall for someone who isn’t your friend first.”
Aziraphale fidgets with the hem of his waistcoat pondering these words.
“I think most people fall rather quickly, too quickly to befriend their potential partner first,” he says, remembering the first time Crowley smiled at him back at Garden Eden, and how tight his ribcage had grown then. It had taken him a while not to always feel like running out of air whenever he was around the demon. A few thousand years or so. He thought it was love. Utter pure, preposterous love. But Crowley wasn't feeling the same, and that was okay. Loving him was enough. Had to. And now, after millennia, the demon has to address it? This simply can't be right. Maybe they are defining the words differently.
“But how would I know?” the angel chuckles nervously.
Crowley tilts his head to the side and considers him.
“You’ve never felt your heart beating a little faster when you looked at me, the corners of your lips curling up even though you didn’t mean them to?”
Aziraphale shrugs. “What difference would it make? Immortals like us…”
“Can catch feelings, too,” the demon argues.
The angel gives him a close-lipped smile. “D… did you?”
“Well, I think I did a few centuries ago. I mean, there was a lot of what humans call ‘love-making’ in the span of my existence but I never really felt anything for them. With you, on the other hand…” he trails off and his fingers over the fabric covering Aziraphale’s arm.
“You love me,” the angel says, sounding sceptical.
“Of course I do. Why else would I hang around with you?”
“Because we’re friends. Friends spend time together, even if the world isn’t ending, you know?”
The demon snorts a laugh. “Yes. But do they also want to do this?” Crowley asks and leans in, his lips hovering in front of Aziraphale’s for a long moment before he brushes them gently against his.
“Pro… probably not,” the angel breathes when the kiss ends way too soon. “Or… very special friends, perhaps.”
Crowley smiles wickedly at him, sending goosebumps all over Aziraphale’s skin.
“I’d like to be your special friend,” Crowley whispers. “Do you want me to?”
Aziraphale nods and seals his unspoken feelings with a kiss of his own. It’s chaste and with closed lips, but it shoots a shared swarm of butterflies through both their bodies.
The angel pulls back a little.
“But we don’t need to do this whole love-making stuff, do we?” he asks, his face twitching in distress.
Crowley shakes his head. “No, angel. We don’t. But this here, it’s nice, isn’t it?”
Aziraphale smiles shyly and nods. “It is, indeed.”
“Wanna walk home and snuggle up in bed?” the demon asks. Aziraphale curls his fingers around the hem of his waistcoat and swallows hard. “We don’t have to if you’re not into that kind of stuff,” Crowley hastens to say.
“I’m not sure. I’ve never… done that.”
A smile blooms on Crowley’s face. “Maybe we should find out then,” he says, gets up and offers his hand for Aziraphale to take.
The angel looks at it for a long moment, then slots their fingers together as he gets off his seat.
“I think you’re right. I love you,” Aziraphale says, chuckling quietly.
“I love you, too, angel,” Crowley says and presses a kiss to Aziraphale’s forehead. “You taught me how.”
“You always had it in you, Crowley.”
“Nah,” the demon says. “Only for you.”
Aziraphale doesn’t protest. He’s always known that Crowley was capable of love and empathy. But this between them? It is a special kind of love that only the two of them share. And who is he to complain about holding his beloved demon’s heart?