Work Text:
I think there's something you should know
I think it's time I stopped the show
There's something deep inside of me
There's someone I forgot to be
It starts in Hyde Park Corner.
The crowd have to hide their eyes from the sun, some with hats and others with pride flags held high above their heads. But it's as if they've been blessed, because the breeze is delightfully cool, so they can walk in moderate comfort even under the glare of the sun. The idea of those bodies, tens of thousands of them, packed together in the streets... Well, the heat would've surely deterred some Londoners from joining the parade. Instead, the weather welcomes them, celebrates with them. Crowley made sure of it.
He won't get in trouble for this. Hell is too busy restructuring to care about Crowley, who, outcast and rebel that he is, is too much trouble than he's worth. Regardless, Shax knows better than to disturb him at the moment. She knows exactly what would happen if she shows up uninvited again. Crowley, for obvious reasons, isn't feeling too generous at the moment. Aziraphale's absence has become a source of rage and misery and Crowley spreads it to everyone he comes across like a plague...
But not today.
Crowley was at the first pride parade in London, and he's been at every one ever since. How could he not be? Crowley has always been the ally of the outcast, the forbidden, the forgotten and the demonised. As was Lucifer, in his own way - he gave home to the rebels, even if that home was as disgusting and cruel as hell.
And is this parade itself not a home, too? A solace and a rebellion. Though pride started as protest it has evolved, and become, though not quite safe yet, celebratory . Crowley has nothing to celebrate, but he belongs there. An entity with no gender, no definitive identity, but who holds love in his heart just the same.
So, as Aziraphale's absence stretched out and summer began, Crowley vowed to let go of his resentment for just one day. To enjoy. To be a part of something he connected with. He could go back to his drunken stupor when it was over. Even if he'd holed up in his apartment, he would've heard the music and seen the flags from his window. Why not join in?
The march begins and Crowley is in the middle of it, just another figure in the crowd as it moves together through London's streets. They walk to Trafalgar Square, where the music is pounding and the drinks are sweet and cool. Down to Leicester Square, where women share their stories and poetry. To Golden Square, where Crowley spots two people kissing and feels a staggering ache in his demonic heart. And then, to Soho, where he resolutely ignores the bookshop, his eyes fixed in the opposite direction as if he could will it to disappear.
But it's then that a cheer erupts. A woman beside Crowley is pointing to the sky. He follows her finger, and there, above the bookshop in a perfect arch, is a rainbow. Crowley feels as if he has been stabbed, then, right in the core of his essence. His eyes sting.
An odd coincidence, he thinks, though as a demon Crowley knows there are no coincidences, there are never coincidences. Still, he chooses to believe it, because the alternative - that the rainbow was put there by someone - hurts more.
Aziraphale watches the rainbow fade and the crowd disperse.
From heaven, he can see all of it. Aziraphale can zoom out and see the crowd as one, joyous mass, or he can focus on each individual grinning face. From a distance the flags shine bright and bold in the sun and give the impression that London is multi-coloured. Aziraphale imagines each building painted the colours of the rainbow. But the parade is leaving and soon Soho is quiet again, and his bookshop is empty, and the rainbow is gone from the sky.
...And the white walls of heaven stay white.
"What are you doing in here?"
Aziraphale startles. He turns quickly, smoothing his expression into something that will please the Metatron.
"Nothing important." Aziraphale lies smoothly, "Did you need something?"
The Metatron tilts his head. Aziraphale expects him to ask a further question, but the Metatron nods and does not push any further.
"Are you ready for the meeting?" He asks.
"Of course."
"Then come." The Metratron says, and Aziraphale follows him, as he always does.
A peculiar thing happens when Aziraphale steps out of the room where the globe of the Earth sits spinning and into the hallway of heaven. When he touches his hand to the white doorknob, rainbow light spills from his fingertips and shines on the doorknob for a moment, as if it's been painted. Aziraphale does not notice it, but the Metratron does. His eyes flicker sharply to the doorknob and the colours fade slowly as if being wiped away.
It happens again in the meeting hall. This meeting is important, terribly so - the return of Jesus is so very soon, and everything must be in place for his arrival. Aziraphale listens carefully and contributes every now and then, always ready to contradict heaven if they become needlessly cruel, and if something interests him he writes it down neatly in his little book.
He writes quickly, practiced with a pen after 6000 years of writing down his thoughts. But when he looks down at what he's written he notes a tinge around every letter, as if they've been smudged with rainbow ink. Aziraphale puts his pen to paper and forms a word slowly, and watches the pen bleed the colours onto the page. He lets go of the pen, alarmed, but notices his fingertips, too, are painted with the colours of the rainbow.
Aziraphale puts his palm down on the table and stares in bewilderment as the white wood turns colorful around his hand. If he keeps his palm there, the colours begin to spread. It's then that Aziraphale notices that the angels around the table have fallen silent.
The Metatron's eyes are dark.
"Aziraphale." He says, sharp as a blade.
"I don't know-" Aziraphale lets out a breathy laugh. "I'm not quite sure what's happening."
The Metatron's stare holds even as he addresses the rest of the angels.
"Meeting dismissed. It will be rescheduled shortly." He says. "Not you, Aziraphale. You stay."
The angels stand, obedient as always, and leave the room. They stare at Aziraphale even as they're leaving, their heads turned over their shoulders. Aziraphale presses his fingers to the sleeve of his new suit. The soulless white fabric erupts with colour.
"What in the devil's name are you doing?" The Metatron asks, as if Aziraphale is playing a trick.
"I haven't the faintest idea." Aziraphale hears himself say, but his mind is fixed on how the rainbow is spilling from him now without abandon. It paints the floor beneath his feet. Sparkles in his eyes. He wonders if, when he conjured his wings, they would be multi-coloured too.
Perhaps this is falling, he thinks. Perhaps that's where those pride colours come from. But if he were falling the Metatron would not be staring at him with such confusion, with such discomfort.
"Whatever it is, you need to stop." He says firmly. "You are the Supreme Archangel, you need to be focused. Don't tell me I made the wrong decision."
"No." Aziraphale says faintly. "Of course you didn't."
He wills the colours to disappear. They're probably, Aziraphale thinks, just an effect of the miracle he performed earlier. He put a rainbow in the sky and part of the rainbow rubbed off on him. The colours listen to his demand, fading away and back into white, though they remain on Aziraphale's fingertips, as if waiting to break free.
"I am willing to forget the incident ever occurred." The Metatron says, and Aziraphale, relieved, smiles. "...If you tell me what you were doing with the globe."
Aziraphale's smile fades. He looks up from his fingertips to meet the Metatron's gaze, and he knows suddenly that the Metatron isn't really asking. It's a test. Of course he knows what Aziraphale was doing. God is always watching.
"Well, you see-" Aziraphale starts, stops, doesn't know the right course to take. He thinks of his rainbow in the sky, above his bookshop, his home. "I was- Just checking in. On, um, ah, on my bookshop!"
The Metatron raises an eyebrow.
"You needn't. It's in good hands."
"Yes, I know, I know." Though he secretly thinks that the only person fit to run his bookshop is himself. "Bad habit, really. And I may have performed a little miracle, which seems to have gone wrong, given my, uh, sudden affliction."
"Was that all?"
"I-" Aziraphale swallows. He feels like the Metatron can see right through him. How could he possibly explain why he had watched the parade? The answer is as complex and as heartbreaking as the reason why Crowley was at the first pride parade and every one since. "I- Yes. Yes, it was."
The Metatron stares at him for a moment longer.
"You must take your duties seriously, Aziraphale. This is not a game."
"I know that, I do." Aziraphale sighs. "I will prove it to you. I'll prove it to God."
"Then there is nothing more to be said." The Metatron says, satisfied again that Aziraphale will roll over and take any instruction that is given to him, answer any question that the Metatron asks, all in the name of God.
But even still, when Aziraphale leaves the meeting room, the doorknob blooms with colour under his fingertips. He looks at it, and makes up his mind.
He needs to see Crowley.
Back at his apartment Crowley throws himself into his chair and does not feel as lonely as usual. The day was so pleasant, so bright and so proud, that even the silence in the huge room doesn't bother him. He sings George Michael to himself as he recalls the day, and he is aware that soon this feeling will fade and he will be left only with emptiness, but for a moment he doesn't really mind.
And then he remembers the couple in the midst of the crowd, kissing, unaware of anyone around them. Crowley understood them. He was reckless and desperate when he kissed Aziraphale, but the act was a rebellion too, against the angels and demons and against God.
It was a miracle he had waited so long. Crowley's heart had been stolen by Aziraphale, who was as careless with it as he was with his flaming sword. No wonder the words came out so quickly when Crowley could finally say them. He was practically spilling over with love, the same love that surrounded that couple like an aura, so bright Crowley had to look away from them.
Suddenly the day does not seem so pleasant and the apartment feels cold and empty again. Crowley, frustrated, jumps from the chair and paces the room. But his apartment is better than heaven, he assures himself. Anything is better than heaven.
Crowley stops pacing. He flicks his fingers and an image appears on a screen before him, hovering in the air. He collapses back into the chair and stares at it miserably. The rainbow above the bookshop.
...The air shifts, the way it does when a miracle occurs. Crowley tenses. Behind the screen, a figure takes shape. Through the transparent screen, which still depicts that rainbow, is Aziraphale.
Crowley thought the next time he saw Aziraphale would be at the end of the world. But here he is. In a new suit with a closed off expression, sure, but it's still Aziraphale. Crowley would know him anywhere.
"No." Crowley snarls. He jumps from his chair again, and takes a step backwards. Aziraphale stands still and watches him. "No you don't. Not today."
"Crowley." Aziraphale says. His voice wavers, uncertain. Crowley says nothing.
Aziraphale continues to look at him. He swipes the screen away with a finger, so that Crowley can see him clearly.
"What do you want?" Crowley asks. Aziraphale lets out a breathy laugh.
"I hardly know." He says.
"...Are you in trouble?" And Crowley, despite himself, knows if the answer was yes he would help Aziraphale with no hesitation. Damn him, he thinks, damn the lot of them. Yet his heart still softens when Aziraphale smiles.
"No, no, nothing like that." Aziraphale says. He steps closer to Crowley, his fingers drifting mindlessly over an ornament in the corner. Crowley pays no attention to his fingers, fixed instead on Aziraphale's face. If he'd glanced at Aziraphale's hands he would've seen the colours, staining Crowley's statue.
"Then why are you here? They'll be missing you-" Crowley scoffs. "In heaven. "
Silence, and then,
"I love watching the parade." Aziraphale says conversationally, "Every year I hear the crowd go past the shop and I stand and watch them from the window."
His fingers drift from the ornament to the wall, and finally Crowley sees the colours spread from Aziraphale's fingertips onto the wall.. He startles at the sight of Aziraphale bringing colour into his apartment. It's so dark in here, the angel had complained once, so clinical. A bit like heaven .
"What the-"
"Oh, ignore this. I performed a miracle earlier." Aziraphale explains. "I think this might just be some risidual light."
Crowley knew, of course he knew, that the rainbow in the sky above the bookshop was not coincidental, but the revelation is another knife in his chest. It cuts deeper than Aziraphale could ever know. So careless, so cruel, Crowley thinks, though Aziraphale does not mean to be either. He is good and kind and lovely, but somehow Crowley always ends up hurt.
"What I meant to say is," Aziraphale says, and Crowley is grateful that he can watch the colours spread (from the wall to the floor, now) rather than look at his face. "I love the parade. And I wish-"
Silence again. The two watch the colours spread with a life of their own.
"Well, I'm jealous of you." Aziraphale says quietly.
“An angel, jealous of a demon?” Crowley scoffs, and he might not have been so scathing if Aziraphale’s past comments weren’t weighing on his mind. He reminds himself that in Aziraphale’s eyes, he’s the bad guy.
“You get to join in.” Aziraphale says. “You get to be a part of this, a part of earth.”
"You made your choice, angel." Crowley says, with very little conviction.
“Oh, Crowley.” Aziraphale says. “So did you.”
But you left, Crowley thinks, grasping at his hair, not me.
“It didn’t have to be this way.” Aziraphale says softly. “We could’ve been…”
Crowley takes a breath. He knows full well what could’ve been. He makes sure his naps are dreamless so that it doesn’t come to him in his sleep.
“But we aren’t.” Crowley says, hurt, and suddenly the rainbow light is gone and Aziraphale looks small and helpless in Crowley’s apartment. The angel looks down at his colourless fingers in surprise.
The miracle has faded.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have come.“ Aziraphale swallows. “I didn’t mean to upset you, I just wanted- Oh, I don’t know.”
And then he’s gone, just as quickly as he arrived, and everything is in black and white, without colour, without Aziraphale.
Heaven is so white. Every day, Aziraphale feels as if the colour inside of him is being stripped away. As if he is being painted over white paint. But beneath that flimsy layer of paint is the truth beneath. A rainbow waiting to be seen.
The next pride is bittersweet.
Crowley stands in the crowd feeling dreadfully lonely. When they reach Soho the sky above the bookshop remains grey and clear, and Crowley feels like he’ll never see colour again, even with all of the rainbows around him.
What would have happened if Aziraphale had said no to heaven? He had kissed Aziraphale recklessly, without a thought for what happened next. If Aziraphale had stayed, if they had went to the Ritz afterwards, what would it be like? Crowley would hate to admit it, but he’s a romantic. Those movies… The misunderstandings and the declarations and the show-stopping final kiss… Would they be like that? Or would they be different?
Even amongst the humans, dating was varied and different. Some never had sex. Some shared their hearts with more than one person. Some were intertwined with their partners and others more distant, but no less in love.
Crowley wonders what being an us would’ve meant to them. He hadn’t thought about it too deeply after Nina and Maggie prompted him to confess. He’d only acted. Thinking of it now, among people just like him, hurts. It’s purposeless. Still, he thinks and he thinks. Would they have been just the same, enjoying life on earth together just with a little more closeness, perhaps a little more communication? Or would they have been different? Would Crowley have been happy? He thinks he would have been.
But he isn’t.
And to top it all off, Crowley feels something damp gently land on his forehead. He looks up and it’s raining. Last year, there had been sun. There had been colour.
He’d been so stupid. What did he think would happen, when he told Aziraphale he wanted to be an us? Of course Aziraphale said no. The rain falls like tears, just a few raindrops at first, and then a stream of them. They won’t stop falling.
Crowley is cold and damp but he still walks on with the parade. He turns away from the bookshop. Someone steps close to him, and a shadow falls over his head, blocking the rain. Crowley turns his head.
Aziraphale.
“Not very nice weather for it.” Aziraphale says. Crowley looks up and is bathed in rainbow light. Not residual magic, just material.
“Where did you get that thing?” Crowley asks, amused despite himself. It’s a rainbow umbrella!
“Oh, do you like it?” Aziraphale asks, clearly pleased with himself. “Tell me you do.”
It’s surreal to see Aziraphale beneath the colours. Aziraphale steps closer still, his side pressed to Crowley’s, and he has to reach up to be able to cover Crowley’s head.
“What are you doing here?”
“This and that.” Aziraphale says vaguely. He gives Crowley a sweet smile. “Oh, don’t make me say it.”
Crowley raises an eyebrow.
“You were right.” He whines. “Okay? And I will do the apology dance, I promise I will, but we have so much to do first.”
“We?”
“Well,” Aziraphale says. “You may have to assist me in stopping the end of the world, and er, the coming of Christ.”
“ What?!”
“Yes, yes, I know.” Aziraphale says. “I need your help.”
In his mind Crowley has already agreed, but a childish part of him wants to string Aziraphale along. Before he can speak, though, Aziraphale stops walking and turns to him.
Their gazes meet beneath the umbrella. All of Crowley’s false protests are forgotten, and the rest of the world fades away. Just the two of them under a rainbow.
“How can I help?” Crowley asks.
“You didn’t even know what I was going to say, and yet-“ Aziraphale sighs. “Oh, Crowley.”
He raises his hand and sets his palm on Crowley’s chest, where his heart would be. And despite himself Crowley feels a heart beating there, underneath his skin. Beating for Aziraphale. Crowley half expects that rainbow light to come spilling from Aziraphale’s fingertips again.
“You’ll really help?” The angel asks.
Crowley gives him a lopsided smile.
“Just say the word.” He says, and though the pain is still there he doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t falter. Their last meeting had been so difficult, so stilted. But there’s something different about Aziraphale today. Something lighter. Crowley doesn’t dare to feel hope, but…
“Why here?” Crowley asks, and Aziraphale shifts uncomfortably. “Why now?”
“It’s only a year on earth.” Aziraphale says. He clenches his fingers in Crowley’s shirt, just slightly. “But it feels like a lifetime in heaven, you know.”
“I know.” Crowley says, because he does. It’s the same in hell.
“I didn’t do it right last year.” Aziraphale says. “I wanted to have another go.”
“Didn’t do what right?”
“This.” Aziraphale says, gesturing around them. “Pride.”
Crowley’s lips twitch. That pesky hope again. It creeps in slowly. In the bookshop, before he knew Aziraphale was going back to heaven, it had choked him.
“Eh?” He asks.
“Do you remember when I said I was jealous of you?” Aziraphale asks. He looks down at his hand on Crowley’s chest. “You’ve never been ashamed to be seen with me. You’ve never pretended to be anyone you’re not.”
Aziraphale takes a shaky breath.
“I have.” He says, “I still do. Every day I’m in heaven.”
“Aziraphale-“
“Just.” Aziraphale closes his eyes. “Just let me say this, Crowley, or I never will.”
Crowley understands. He held so much inside for 6000 years and there is still so much unspoken.
“I want to be proud of who I am.” Aziraphale pauses. He searches Crowley’s eyes. “I want to be proud of how I feel for you.”
Oh. Crowley feels a burst of hope, of joy , and suddenly the sun is shining and hits the umbrella and bathes the angel and the demon in colour. Surely it’s a dream, Crowley thinks, slipping through his dreamless sleep, taunting him. But he isn’t waking up. This is real.
“Can we be an… us?” Aziraphale asks. “Whatever that may be?”
“Ngk.” Crowley says, and Aziraphale smiles. It’s been so long since Crowley has seen him smile so genuinely. The silence between them is warm. Warm and… anticipating.
“Can I…?” Aziraphale asks. He leans up, and when Crowley nods, his other hand cups Crowley’s cheek. Crowley realises then how perfect the moment is. Where else could Aziraphale find pride?
Crowley closes his eyes. Their second kiss doesn’t hurt, not like the first. His arms snake around Aziraphale’s back and pull him closer, and the rainbow touches them everywhere, staining everything, bringing colour back into Crowley’s world. They’re together, they’re here, surrounded by thousands of people who understand just what it feels like to feel a love that doesn’t quite fit into any box. Crowley has never felt so proud.
“Do you think there’s a word to describe us?” Aziraphale asks.
Of course he would ask that. Clever, literary Aziraphale, who had seen the birth of language, who read and read and read.
“Does there need to be?” Crowley asks. He watches Aziraphale take a sip of wine, feeling contented.
“I suppose not.” Aziraphale says.
“But there are others like us.” Crowley says, because he wonders if that what Aziraphale meant in the first place. There is nothing worse than loneliness. Than feeling you are the only being in the universe that feel something. “Gabriel and Beelzebub, for one.”
Aziraphale smiles.
“I wonder how many times this has happened.”
“However many it was, I was the first.” Crowley says.
“Hm? The first what?”
”The first demon to fall in love with an angel.”
”Ah.” Aziraphale chuckles. “You seem very proud of that.”
“I am.”
Aziraphale raises his glass. His cheeks are pink, and his eyes are sparkling. Though they can’t see it, the two of them are bathed in rainbow light.
“To pride.” Aziraphale says. Crowley raises his glass.
“To pride.” Crowley smiles.