Chapter Text
It was a peaceful day in London. The sun was out, painting brilliant patterns upon the street as tourists bustled about, the scent of black tea and anticipation heavy around them. There was lively chatter in the coffee shop on the corner, and a little scottie dog trotted triumphantly down the sidewalk. No one seemed to remember or care that the world had almost ended just a few months before.
No one, that is, except for the angel, sitting comfortably in his bookshop, engrossed in the pages of Pride and Prejudice. He’d always been fascinated by human courtship, but today, with the sunlight sprawled out across his desk, he felt a certain extra keenness he couldn’t quite place, as if he knew precisely how Elizabeth Bennet felt. It was an odd feeling, but not an unpleasant one, he decided.
Just then, the very moment Mr. Darcy began to tickle the ivories of a piano, the door to the shop swung wide open, tinkling the bell at the top. Aziraphale did not so much as look up from his Jane Austen as he announced cheerily, “Good morning, Crowley.”
“Afternoon,” the demon corrected, by way of greeting.
“Oh, is it?” Aziraphale mused, easing his reading glasses off his nose and folding them gently by his side. “I hadn’t noticed.” He closed his book, albeit begrudgingly. The scenes where the cold and stiff Mr. Darcy showed vulnerability were always his favorite.
Crowley breezed across the room as effortlessly as ever, approaching Aziraphale’s desk just closely enough to thump a book down atop it, before retreating to a chair, where he sprawled his snake-like body across it in his usual crass way. On impulse, Aziraphale sat up even straighter, his posture nothing short of divine.
“What’s this?” he asked, surprised, but Crowley didn’t answer. He just rolled his ankle, foot spinning round and round from where it hung recklessly off the arm rest, expression hidden by his dark sunglasses. Aziraphale put his reading glasses back on, peering curiously at the cover. Beowulf. Peculiar. Crowley should have known his collection a little better than that by now. “I should hope you know I already have a copy of-”
“Not one like this,” Crowley interrupted and Aziraphale’s mouth went dry with hope. Could it be…?
He flipped through the pages reverently, trying not to appear too ravenous for answers, until he landed on the correct page – the one that had been incomplete ever since the fire in 1732. He still saw it sometimes, when he closed his eyes; the licking reds and oranges of destruction, taking his precious collection away.
His eyes grew wide with surprise as he saw them there, written down in Crowley’s own infernal handwriting – the lines that had once been irrevocably lost. He looked up at the demon in his bookshop, knowing he could no longer hide the excitement and shock on his face, as he breathed out, “Lines-”
“2227-2230,” Crowley finished.
He felt every muscle in his face soften with an adoration that was all too familiar, and a tiny bit frightening. “You remembered.”
Was this how Elizabeth Bennet had felt when she read Mr. Darcy’s letters for the first time? This half-fluttering of his heart in his chest? The warmth in his palms and the backs of his knees? Human bodies had always been strange, but these sensations were beyond weird. Odd, he thought again, but not unpleasant.
“’Course I did,” Crowley shrugged casually, as if he hadn’t just made Aziraphale’s decade. Possibly his entire century.
Aziraphale looked back at Beowulf, complete at last, grazing his fingers over Crowley’s chicken-scratch, knowing no human on Earth could ever read it - and not just because his handwriting was bad - and smiled so tenderly to himself he wondered if Heaven would sense a new miracle.
“Oh, Crowley,” he murmured, “You shouldn’t have.”
Crowley swung his leg around so he was actually sitting up though to say he was sitting up straight would be an egregious lie. He was so hunched over he was hardly even there! Aziraphale resisted the urge to make his way over to the demon, put one hand on his shoulder and one on the small of his back, and assist him in sitting like a proper gentleman. But then he’d always thought it wasn’t the best idea to go about touching demons. It wasn’t as if he could contract sin from Crowley like a disease but… He’d been pushing his luck for thousands of years now. It was best to remind himself there were still lines he shouldn’t cross. He wasn’t sure where those lines ended with Crowley exactly but he was honestly a little too afraid to find out. So he mostly kept his hands to himself.
“I shouldn’t have invented Crocs is what I shouldn’t have done,” Crowley countered. “But well, terrible demon, terrible designs, I s’pose.”
“Crocs aren’t… Terrible.” Aziraphale had worn them a time or two after losing a bet with Crowley that Joan of Arc would die of old age and another that Prohibition would be a success in America, and he hadn’t actually minded them all that much. He closed Beowulf, fidgeting with his hands. “And neither are you,” he added. He tried to say it defiantly, as though Crowley’s kindness was some advantage Heaven had over him, but they both knew it was much more than that. Aziraphale liked complimenting Crowley, and he had a suspicion that Crowley liked being complimented.
The demon pushed himself up out of the chair, gangly limbs heading immediately for the door. “Well, that’s enough insults for one day,” he deflected, but Aziraphale stood, suddenly no longer wanting to go back to reading if it meant Crowley wouldn’t be around to talk to.
“Crowley, wait!” he called, and the demon slowed, hovering by the door.
“I…” he searched for some reasonable excuse why he didn’t want Crowley to leave. Now that they weren’t affiliated with Heaven or Hell they were free to hang out whenever they pleased, but it still seemed strange, not having a good reason. Before they’d had wars and art to discuss, big players in the Ineffable game, but now everything was quiet again, and while it was a relief, it also got a tad bit… Lonely.
“I’m feeling a bit peckish,” he decided, which wasn’t a lie – he tried to steer away from those. “I have a hankering for that… The salad with the crab, and the vegetable… Oh, you know, where they use the seeds, and…”
Aziraphale was mildly aware he was making a fool of himself, but mostly he just wanted to be with Crowley, and to remember what it was that vegetable was called. It was on the tip of his tongue…
“Dorset crab,” Crowley said.
“Yes! Yes, that's what I want.”
Crowley’s eyebrow quirked up, though not unkindly. “You want to go to the Ritz?”
Aziraphale nodded emphatically. “Yes. And I was hoping that maybe… You could drive?”
He couldn’t quite meet the demon’s eyes as he said this, shaded though they were. He knew the moment they were both remembering as the offer hovered in the air between them even before Crowley responded, placing his hands shallowly in his pockets as if he wasn’t sure what else to do with them.
“Oh no, no, angel, you wouldn’t like that.” A pang went through Aziraphale like he’d been struck with a blade. Crowley might as well have said, I drive too fast, remember?
But Aziraphale didn’t want to think about that day right now, or the holy water, or anything he had and hadn’t said. He just wanted to go to the Ritz and have a nice salad with… What was it again that they put in with the crab?
He came out from behind his desk and approached Crowley carefully, as one might approach a snake. “Well, I think if you promise to stay below the speed limit… That I actually rather would,” he pressed, ever the noble angel extending an olive branch.
“Demons don’t make promises,” Crowley hissed, “And they don’t drive below the speed limit. Humans don’t drive below the speed limit!” Aziraphale nodded along with his complaints but headed towards the door, holding it politely open for Crowley who walked right on through. “You might as well ask the Bentley to play Classical,” he huffed.
“Well, now that you mention-”
“No.”
And so it was that they walked to the Bentley, all but arm in arm, and Aziraphale finally remembered that it was fennel that they put in the Dorset Crab, which of course was not nearly as important as the fact that he and Crowley were still side by side – and there was nothing that Heaven or Hell could do about it.