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It was an assignment from Heaven that started it.
A young man on the wrong path, the letter said. The son of a politician, who would be great if he could be persuaded to focus on his studies. Go have a word with him, Aziraphale.
The letter had left out a few things. First off, that the only time he’d be able to even get near the fellow was at Portland Place-- Aziraphale had met him there in passing and found him boorish and venal, far more inclined to the younger members than hanging about with oldsters like him.
Second, Aziraphale thought as he laughed a laugh he didn’t mean and tried to steer the conversation back toward improvement and social responsibility, he had vastly underestimated how much of a boor the man actually was. Heaven definitely had their work cut out for them there. The combination of self-importance and privilege was nearly as good as a wall against everything he was trying to do.
“Pardon me,” someone said, coming up behind him.
He leapt at the interruption. “I say, it’s--” He turned and there was Crowley, tall and whip-thin and dapper in a night-black suit. “Oh! Hello!”
“Hiya. Listen, pardon us just for a tick, need a word with the angel here.”
The young man shrugged and wandered off, to the bar by the look of it. Aziraphale did not collapse in relief but it was a near thing.
“Crowley! How did you end up here of all places?”
“Thwarting you,” Crowley said easily, pulling him over to where music was being played. A tug and a turn, and they were tucked over to the side where nobody was paying attention to how well-- or badly-- they were dancing. “Looked like you needed it.”
“Oh, thank you,” Aziraphale said, falling into the gentle sway of Crowley’s arms.
“Oi! Don’t go thanking me, that’s all I need.” Crowley pulled him in a tight turn, swinging him farther out of the lamplight. “I’m only here to make sure you didn’t send that one to Heaven.”
“Small hope of that,” Aziraphale murmured, then clapped a hand over his mouth. “I mean... I’m dreadfully sorry, of course everyone deserves the opportunity for redemption.”
“Chance’d be a fine thing.” Crowley was laughing at him, the villain. “You can talk to that kid til you’re blue in the face, angel, but he’s not ever going to change his ways as long as he refuses to ever believe that he’s done anything wrong.”
Aziraphale looked over Crowley’s shoulder at where the young man already had designs on someone else, clearly trying to entice them off to one of the private rooms. “Sometimes I wonder whether Heaven ever actually looks at the people they tell me to bless,” he said, and his breath caught in his throat. Somehow when he was trying to get a good look, his arms had come up around Crowley’s shoulders.
He should bring them down. He should. He should call a stop to the dancing, and unwind his arms from his best friend mortal adversary.
He really should.
He didn’t.
“Not any more than Hell does, I suspect.” Crowley went blithely on with the conversation as though all this was normal. As though it was not practically an act of cuddling going on here. As though agents of Heaven or Hell-- or even the London Met-- might not find them at any moment.
Aziraphale’s heart pounded in his ears.
“Angel?” Crowley pulled back a little to meet his eyes. “Angel, you okay in there?”
“We’re dancing,” he said stupidly.
“Yeah? Wanted a word, and didn’t figure you’d want to be seen going into one of the rooms.”
He thought about the implications of that for a moment. Crowley knew what sometimes went on in the rooms. Crowley knew that Aziraphale might not want to be seen going in, which means he probably knew that Aziraphale as a matter of course didn’t go in....
“How long have you...” He started.
“Been awake?” They were almost in shadow, now; the room might as well have had nobody but them, locked in this impossible embrace.
“Yes. But how long have you known? About me, and, and this place?”
“Found you when I woke up, didn’t I?” Crowley’s laugh rumbled against his chest. Crowley’s breath ghosted across his ear. “They love their angel. It wasn’t hard.”
“It’s dangerous,” Aziraphale said, still swaying gently.
“It’ll be fine. For now. Everyone’s distracted.”
Distracted how? He wanted to ask, and was afraid to. “What did you want to talk to me about?” he said instead.
That rumbling laugh again. “You looked like you needed a rescue. So I guess I wanted to say, ‘wow, what a prick’.”
Aziraphale threw his head back and laughed.