Work Text:
One afternoon, about two months into quarantine, Aziraphale was busy pretending to be immersed in one of the many books in his ever-growing collection, just so he could avoid feeling guilty about having turned down a visit from Crowley the very day before.
What he did wasn’t exactly impolite in those Covid-ridden times, since humans would assume that they were breaking the rules by meeting at all, but he couldn’t lie: he missed his friend more than he’d expected to when the nationwide lockdown began. Especially since the crisis didn’t seem to be ending anytime soon –definitely not in July, like the demon predicted.
And yes, Aziraphale had called him in hopes of convincing him to meet in the shop, and had managed to do just that, but it felt too… naughty of him –to say the least– to breach the safety protocols just to have a chat and get drunk, while everyone else in the world had to keep their families and loved ones at bay to avoid getting sick.
Once the angel noticed that he had been re-reading the same paragraph for about 10 minutes, he decided to close down the book and give Crowley another call.
However, he immediately remembered that his friend had at the very least told him he planned on sleeping this period off, much like he’d done during the Black Plague. It would be rude to wake him up if he was that bored! He also might refuse to go see Aziraphale this time, given the interruption and all.
The continued flow of reasons not to call overwhelmed him, but they also annoyed him. “Ahhh, just do it!”, Aziraphale reprimanded himself out loud. He took off his reading glasses, reached for his trusty rotary phone and dialed the number.
Crowley picked up quickly, and suppressed a yawn. “Wot?” Yet again, he didn’t let him say hello first.
“I… uh… changed my mind”.
“About what?” The demon was suspicious.
“You um… slithering over here”, Aziraphale said almost inaudibly.
“Oh?”
“I suppose I could use the company”, he admitted, blushing despite himself.
“I thought you were ‘catching up on your reading’” he replied in his best Aziraphale impression. He’d been working on it for a while. “And what about the rules?”
The angel began questioning himself all over again, but tried to stand his ground. In his own style. “Well… I just thought that since you were terribly bored… you might enjoy yourself more over here”.
“Avoiding my questions, huh?” Aziraphale felt a bead of sweat drip down his forehead when he decided to stay silent for just long enough.
“Okay, I’ll be there in 10”, Crowley eventually announced, sounding resigned.
The timing piqued Aziraphale’s interest. “I thought you were at your flat? Didn’t you say you’d sleep for a few months?”
The demon chuckled hollowly. “Um… it’s a long story. I’ll explain when I get there. Do you want anything to eat?”
“I still have plenty of baked goods left, dear. But thank you for offering”.
Crowley cleared his throat loudly. “Right. See you in a bit”.
*
Not a soul was on the street when Crowley arrived at the bookshop, and no cars were parked around it either. A strange view indeed, given that Soho was usually anything but empty. Once he got out of the Bentley, he looked every way he could before knocking on the door, confirming that the coast was clear.
And just in case, he mentally checked if anyone was watching him Up or Downstairs. Nothing either. Not like they were too keen on him –or the angel– since Armageddon was reverted, but one could never know if they’d decide to punish them again, even if being persona non grata was their saving grace in that moment.
Aziraphale unlocked the door after the first knock. Crowley didn’t want to comment on how fast he was, but he couldn’t help it.
“Didn’t realize you needed the wine that bad, angel”. He shoved a case of Chateau Margeaux on Aziraphale, who grabbed it clumsily. His reflexes were rusty as ever.
“Oh… right. I actually forgot you said you’d bring some over. I dusted off a bottle of brandy before you got here, if you’d like some”, he smiled at Crowley, who tensed up without thinking. He lowered his head and made his way inside.
“Had been craving some lately, believe it or not”, he managed to respond as he walked around the room, trying to appear distracted.
Aziraphale placed the cradle on the first spot he found unoccupied, and rushed to lock up again. Some neighbors had been using the pandemic as an excuse to be even more nosey than before. So if anyone found out that he was receiving a guest –or worse, a customer– his days were numbered, socially speaking.
The demon found his way to the brandy as the angel finished securing the place, and drawing the curtains just in case, which left them in the dark for less than a second, when a small hand wave from Aziraphale turned the artificial lighting on.
Having removed his sunglasses already, Crowley raised one eyebrow when he looked back at his frazzled friend. Aziraphale got even more nervous when he noticed his quizzical gaze.
“Uh… neighbors are being extremely cautious nowadays”, he explained.
Crowley replied with a half-smirk as he poured two glasses for them. “Strange times tend to change humans for the worse, I s’pose”.
Aziraphale hurried back to toast with him quietly. “You can say that again”.
They both downed the drinks in one go and stayed silent for a while, looking in different directions of the shop.
“I heard that some people on the… interwebs are trying new ways to make coffee”, the angel tried, just to say something.
“Why?” The demon groaned. “The way I see it, you either put creamer or milk in it or you don’t. Simple as that”.
“Well, they are using milk, but I believe that they whisk it so that the foam–”
Crowley appeared scandalized when he slammed the glass down. “What’s the point? It all goes down the drain anyways! As long as it wakes you up or calms you down, who cares what the foam looks like?”
This unexpected tirade made Aziraphale’s eyebrows shoot up. “I did not realize this was a sensitive subject, dear. I apologize”. Crowley only provided an eye roll as a response, but he did settle down.
“So”, he sighed. “What should we do? Now that I’m here, I mean”.
Much to his chagrin, Aziraphale trembled. “What do you mean? I– I thought we’d just have a drink together”.
The demon was terrible at masking his disappointment. “Oh”.
But then, the angel remembered that he meant to ask him something. “How about you tell me why you were only 10 minutes away from the shop when I last called?”
Crowley scratched his head. “W– well, erm– it really is a long story, angel–”
“Crowley”, finally making eye contact, he shot him down before he could get away with not telling him. “Neither of us are particularly busy right now, are we?”
“Sure– I mean–”
“What is it?”, Aziraphale insisted.
“I am… well… I’m sort of… not… livinginmyflat. Right now”.
The angel was perplexed, but did not miss a beat. “How so? Did something happen?”
Crowley took a long breath. “Well… the flat came with the demon job and I’m currently… unemployed, so–”
“So you’re telling me”, Aziraphale’s voice raised with every syllable, “that for the last however many months since we were excommunicated you’ve been homeless?!”
“N– not as such…” He grinned nervously before mumbling: “Been living in the Bentley”.
Aziraphale was even more apprehensive than before. “Why didn’t you tell me?!”, he shouted again.
Crowley had no excuses prepared, which is why he avoided the topic like the plague. No pun intended. “It slipped my mind?”
“And it didn’t occur to you that you could stay–” Aziraphale cut himself off. He was about to offer him the perpetually empty room upstairs, but suddenly realized that it might be too forward. Even if it was just a possibility.
“Stay… where?”, the demon probed.
“At a hotel or… inn…”, was the only thing that came to the angel’s mind to replace the phrase that kept ringing in his head: at my place .
Crowley didn’t even attempt to hide his disappointment that time. “Right… It just seemed like too much trouble, I guess. Besides, they’ve all shut down now because of the virus…”
The silence enveloped them once again. Since they had been forced to coexist on Earth for ages, not talking when they were upset had become a crutch that they hadn’t grown tired of, even if they knew that boundaries like that were completely unnecessary once they stopped reporting to their respective offices the previous year.
On that note, Crowley ventured to speak first. “Shall we have another glass?”
*
They spent about two hours drinking and chatting occasionally while sat at the table Aziraphale kept in the backroom, playing a few Mahler records that Crowley brought over as background music. He’d carelessly slipped them inside the wine case, which provoked Aziraphale’s ire once more, but he softened when Crowley half-heartedly revealed that he was thinking of him when he bought them.
“How are you liking the bundt cake?” Eating wasn’t the demon’s favorite human activity, and the angel knew as much, but he still decided that he wasn’t going to let his friend leave before he tried at least one of his creations.
“S’good”, Crowley replied unenthusiastically after finishing the slice. It did taste quite nice, but in his book, no human recipe was more delectable than alcohol.
Aziraphale pouted. “You don’t like it”.
“I just said it’s good, angel”, was his deadpan defense.
“Well, I don’t think you mean it”, he argued back, crossing his arms.
Crowley struggled for a minute to produce a more acceptable reply. “You know that I don’t eat too often… but it’ssss… nice”.
Aziraphale was still a bit tetchy, but decided to let it go, if only because he was suddenly reminded that this was his first interaction with someone in the flesh since the lockdown began. And Crowley being on the other end of it was all the more thrilling, although he preferred to keep that bit to himself.
“I missed this”, said the demon, as if he’d just read Aziraphale’s mind. Crowley interpreted his lack of a reaction as a sign to carry on, but the angel was simply frozen. “It gets so tiring to talk on the phone… and the booze doesn’t hurt, either”, he had another sip to emphasize the last point.
It was Aziraphale’s turn to be unsure of what to say. He toyed with his glass just to have something to do as he gathered his thoughts. His face was heating up again, and he couldn’t really blame it on the brandy.
But Crowley wasn’t done yet. “I wanted… I meant to visit sooner–”
Aziraphale startled. “You did?”
“Of course, but…”
They faced each other after a long time, and Aziraphale feared he’d get choked up if he addressed out loud how guilty Crowley looked.
He’d only seen raw, unfiltered emotion pouring out of his friend’s face once before: when he’d found him in the pub after he foolishly discorporated in the bookshop. And despite them not “having a side” since then, to acknowledge that he ached to comfort him was more frightening than ever.
So Aziraphale was compelled to avert his gaze, because very real tears were close to slipping out if he kept staring at Crowley.
“Well?” He kept moving the glass around for lack of anything more substantial to say.
Crowley tried to chuckle, but it came out strained. “I thought it was better to wait until you called me. You’re the one that’s always going on and on about the rules, after all. And I don’t want either of us getting in trouble for… you know”. Aziraphale raised an eyebrow at him.
“Fraternizing”, Crowley eventually blurted out.
The angel couldn’t contain his laughter.
“Hey!” Crowley started, but couldn’t get another word in for a few seconds too many, until Aziraphale began pulling himself together. “Are you drunk, angel?”
“Not at the moment, dear”, he replied in between giggles. “The thing is that Heaven does not –pardon my language– give a damn what I do or not nowadays. I’ve checked. They haven’t looked down at us once since we parted ways”.
“And that is funny because… ?”
Aziraphale spoke as if he was out of breath. “It’s just that they haven’t been a real problem for a while, and I was just too afraid to call you, despite thinking about it since the lockdown was imposed. And it’s funny, because do you really believe that a former angel would be a priority for them during a global pandemic?” He forced out another laugh, though much darker.
The angel continued rambling about being detached from his higher ups for the first time in 6.000 years, and Crowley finally understood the meaning of the expression “a car-crash you can’t look away from”. For his friend, unbeknownst to him, sounded impossibly lonely.
Protective as he usually was when it came to Aziraphale, the only course of action that instinctively occurred to him was to grab his hand, which put an end to his rant in one go.
“Crowley?” Aziraphale’s eyes were filled with tears when he met the serpent ones again.
The demon sighed. “You should’ve called me sooner”.
That made Aziraphale break down. “What would that accomplish?”
“It’s always better when we’re alone together, don’t you agree?” He stroked his hand as he watched his tears stream down one by one.
The angel later figured that what felt vital for him to do in that moment could earn him eternal punishment one day, but that risk did not matter to him when he freed his other hand by placing the forgotten glass on the table, and pulled Crowley into a tight embrace.
Despite yearning for it almost every time Crowley was around, he’d never had the courage to do it. Love was the easiest thing for Aziraphale, and he had to train himself over the years to keep it under wraps when it came to the demon.
But he had rescued him for the umpteenth time, on this occasion without knowing beforehand how much he needed him, and he had to show his gratitude somehow. Turning your back on your supposed allies was difficult enough, but losing touch with your only friend in the process had been devastating, and it had taken him this long to put that together.
Initially, Crowley was tempted to ask Aziraphale what he was doing, but he soon realized that he could no longer play dumb with him. So he found a comfortable nook in his neck and stayed there, letting his smell relax him.
They held each other tight until the day turned into night, and the neighborhood was even quieter than when Crowley first dropped by.
Surprisingly, Aziraphale was the one to let go. They shared a meaningful look as he retrieved his chair back to its proper place. He’d stopped crying hours before.
“You don’t know how long I’ve thought about doing that”, he admitted. Crowley’s throat closed up.
Then, they went back to sipping their drinks, tepid as they were. At some point, Crowley noticed that the last record that hit the needle had long finished playing, so he snapped his fingers to have it stop spinning and retrieve it back into its sleeve.
“You can stay here”, Aziraphale finally offered.
A small smile formed on the demon’s face. “You don’t have to–”
“But I do. You can’t keep sleeping in the car”, he reasoned simply.
“I don’t have to sleep–”
Aziraphale placed his hand on Crowley’s. “I know that. But you wanted to”.
Crowley’s glassy yellow eyes betrayed his attempt at nonchalance. “Cheers”.
“That’s what friends are for”. Aziraphale gripped Crowley’s hand for good measure before letting go.
But Crowley’s arms soon enveloped him in another hug, more gentle than the one before, hesitant even.
“How long can I stay?” he dared to ask, his face buried in Aziraphale’s neck again.
Caught off guard, but still confident, the angel let out a long breath before replying. “You shouldn't ask questions that you already know the answer to”.
With his arms still wrapped around him, Crowley lifted his head just enough to make eye contact with Aziraphale. A chill promptly went down his spine when he saw the determination in his face. “Noted”.
Aziraphale was well aware of what people tended to do in moments like these. It just never occurred to him that he would feel such an urge to close the small distance that separated him from the demon.
Crowley had a very similar thought process, but he was always the more impulsive one of the two. “Can I–?”
And yet, the angel still nodded before he could have a go at completing the sentence.
Cautiously, as if approaching something made of glass –which very well might’ve been the case-, Crowley first nuzzled Aziraphale’s cheek with his nose, placing the softest of kisses on it, when he realized that he was tensing up under his touch.
“You’re okay, angel”, were the demon’s words of encouragement. He could feel the faintest of yelps coming from Aziraphale’s throat as he inched closer to his mouth.
Desperation is too strong a word for the rush of excitement that Aziraphale was trying to process, but even so, it couldn’t begin to describe it. The fact that any kind of physical affection was completely off the table for them for centuries upon centuries made him tremble in Crowley’s arms.
“Easy”, his voice mellowly reassured him, as he resorted to pecking him gently in other areas of the face when he felt him shaking. Crowley’s drive to calm Aziraphale down was the only reason he himself was composed in the first place.
The angel finally relaxed, his eyes fluttering closed as he intuitively held Crowley even tighter, and their lips found each other before either of them could pull away again.
Despite having no experience in the field, they kissed carefully, yet passionately. Comfortably, like they’d been doing it forever, but taking moments to breathe in between because the familiarity made it even more overwhelming.
“I have no idea if what I am doing is… proper… etiquette?” Aziraphale posed some time later, mostly to himself.
Crowley bit his lip, and went for a more diplomatic question instead of an answer. “Is it what you expected?”
They locked eyes again. Crowley’s devotion for Aziraphale was palpable. The angel thought that his own adoration for him was, too.
“I don’t know. Didn’t think that it was possible”, he confessed sheepishly. The demon could not believe how smitten he got him. “But I want to do it again”.
Crowley smiled unabashedly. “Good thing that I’m staying over until July”.