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They stay until the man upon the cross exhales his last breath. Until the crowds have considerably thinned and his mother is weeping at its wooden feet.

Aziraphale sniffles, from time to time. Crowley is torn between offering him a handkerchief and looking away to preserve the angel's dignity. Unfortunately, looking away means staring at the giant cross and the body gruesomely strung upon it, the bloodied figure of a man with whom Crowley had chatted amicable mere days before, whose only crime had been telling the humans to treat each other better. Looking at Aziraphale means confronting his own grief. And his anger. The angel's white attire only reminds Crowley of those bastards Upstairs, with their 'Great Plan' this, 'Ineffability' that. He wonders how much Aziraphale had known of the poor man's fate, and for how long. Heaven, he needs something to drink.

"I," Crowley starts, turning to look at the angel who, complicit or not, stood beside him during the entire ordeal, "am going to get incredibly drunk." Aziraphale draws his eyes away from Mary and towards him, a tiny frown creasing his forehead. It's not disapproval—not yet. Only confusion. "Guess I'll see you around, angel."

He waits for him to say something. Anything from Very well, mind how you go to I can't believe you indulge in drunkenness or even Begone, fiend. It all depends on Aziraphale's mood and willingness to pretend, these days.

What Crowley doesn't expect is for the angel to heave a tired sigh and ask, "May I join you?"

The demon stares. "You don't drink."

"No. I don't, but- Well." Aziraphale flounders and gestures around with his hands under Crowley's attentive gaze. He is nervous, which means whatever he's going to say will be worth listening to. The demon leans just the slightest bit forward to better catch the stammering speech. "I would rather not be alone. If you don't mind it terribly, that is."

Crowley considers it. It's not the first time they'd spend time together, despite the nature of their respective work. It's been a long time since he's thought of Aziraphale as an enemy in anything more than just the title—if he ever has at all.¹

That is not the issue. His foul mood is.

Nonetheless, there is something in the angel's expression, something tentative, broken, that makes refusal crawl back down Crowley's throat with no intention of ever getting out again.

"Suit yourself," Crowley shrugs. "But fair warning—I am going to get properly wasted. Absolutely sloshed."

Aziraphale sighs. Crowley doesn't know whether it's out of relief or disapproval.

"And where did you plan on going? I imagine the local taverns will be full with the day's gossip." He says it with barely-concealed disdain. It softens Crowley, just a little.

"I was just going to crash at mine, really. That alright? Or do you draw the line at entering a demon's lair?" He can't resist it, the needling. He feels the need to wheedle Aziraphale today, fall back into their predetermined roles. He needs to remind himself of what they are—what Crowley is. A demon, not one of the weepy human friends of the poor lad on the cross.

Aziraphale, on the contrary, seems to have abandoned their usual banter in favour of levelling exasperated looks at Crowley. He doesn't appreciate the new development, really.

"After you."

Which is how they end up in the run-down hut Crowley had managed to get for himself before running to the crucifixion site. At least it has the basics—a table, some chairs, a cot that leaks hay out of the rips in it, and a few jugs of fragrant, rich wine.

"Welcome to my den of iniquity." Crowley gestures to encompass the one and only room in the hut. "Sorry if it disappoints. I was in a bit of a hurry getting here."

Aziraphale hums politely as the demon makes a beeline for the wine. "It's very similar to mine, actually."

"Really?" Crowley sips straight from the overfilled jug. The drink is velvety on his tongue, warming his throat on the way down. That's better. "Heaven got you front row tickets for the crucifixion yet they couldn't fix you up with more comfortable lodgings?"

Something flashes in the angel's eyes then. He's hurt. Good. Crowley is a demon, he's supposed to bring harm to any angels he encounters.

He keeps telling himself that as he takes another, bigger gulp of wine. It goes straight to the hollow in his chest.

Aziraphale breathes in and straightens, hands folded together at his front. "I know you're upset," he starts, tentatively. Crowley bristles—how dare the angel treat him like a fragile thing? "But I truly had nothing to do with this."

"Yeah, well." The demon falls back on a chair, the wine in his hand dangerously close to spilling over his clothes. Luckily, it knows better. "It's done now, isn't it? What's arguing gonna change? Bloke'll be just as dead."

"Yes. At least for a few days."

Crowley hurts his neck turning to look at Aziraphale. "What d'you mean?"

The angel blinks. He takes the seat in front of Crowley, blue eyes wide.

"You don't know?"

"Do I look like I know?" Crowley retorts, biting the words. "All they said Down There was 'oh, go mess with Her son, Crowley, make him stray from his path'. Would have been nice if they'd mentioned  what that path was, mind you." He takes another chug of wine. A bloody rivulet drips down the corner of his mouth. He dabs at it with his sleeve and fixes the angel under his glare. "What do you know?"

And so, Aziraphale tells him of what Crowley thinks is one of Heaven’s secrets, not supposed to reach the ears of demons like him. But the angel doesn’t protest, even if there is a thick air of discomfort around him as he unfurls the tale of what will happen in three days time. Crowley listens in stunned silence, sipping from his jug until it's half-full, his mind growing hazier by the second under the influence of alcohol and puzzlement both. 

When Aziraphale finishes, the only thing Crowley has to say is, “Huh.”

“It's a bit convoluted, I know. It's apparently been in the works for a while now. I only recently learned of it.”

There are so many things Crowley could answer. He could go with the thousand critiques bouncing in his mind. He could rage about the gratuitous suffering, or the million-step plans that She puts into motion with none of them the wiser. But one look at Aziraphale's face halts his tongue. There is guilt in there, so much of it. At telling Crowley? At Heaven's doings? If Crowley speaks now, will he make it better or worse? Will it push Aziraphale to question, like Crowley had once? Or will it pit the angel against him in another battle of wills?

That sounds… lonely.

Crowley doesn't want to be alone today.

The fiery retorts die in the demon's throat as he wordlessly offers Aziraphale the jug of wine.

The angelic bastard recoils. 

“'S just wine, angel,” Crowley drawls. “It won't bite you.”

"I know that. And I recall I’ve already told you how I feel about alcohol.”

Ah. There is a challenge, a game Crowley can play. He leans forward in his seat, considering. 

“You also said food was gross,” he starts, swirling the jug as if lost in thought, his eyes pinning the angel down. “Yet I recall Job's ox ribs rapidly dwindling in number after you tried just the one.” Aziraphale looks away, ashamed. That's not the demon's goal. If Crowley isn’t careful, he'll lose the angel to the reproaches in his own head. He gentles his tone, smiles a bit. “C'mon. Just a sip. If you don’t like it, then I promise I won't offer again.”

Something shines in Aziraphale's blue eyes. By now, Crowley can recognise the look of a person falling into temptation—a person who wishes for something so desperately, only needing a little, tiny push to gather the courage to reach out and take it. Aziraphale is teetering on the edge of that precipice. One word, one move from Crowley, and he'll have him plummeting down with no parachute. But the demon bites his tongue, and stays still as a breathing statue. He won't. He wants the decision to be Aziraphale's, and Aziraphale's alone. Anything else would feel like coercion, like the purpose of this is dirtying his acquaintance's soul as much as possible.

It isn’t. 

He only wants someone to share a drink with. 

Aziraphale sighs. He grumbles something unintelligible. He grabs the jug from Crowley's hands.

The demon grins as the angel tries the drink. It's warm, and not from the best vineyard Crowley has ever tasted, but it's good enough. Not too strong, sweet and bitter at the same time. He watches as Aziraphale takes the tiniest of sips, probably spilling more wine over his chin than the amount that enters his mouth. The angel scrunches his nose as he swallows. 

There's a moment when he goes to give the jug back to Crowley, a disgusted expression on his face, and then he stops. Considers. Takes a second, slightly bigger sip.

Temptation accomplished. 

Crowley puts his elbow on the armrest and sets his head on his hand, a smug smirk on his lips. 

“So. What d'you think?”

“It's not... bad,” Aziraphale says slowly. He sips again—gulps it like water, this time. Crowley raises his eyebrows. “It burns a little. Down my throat.”

“Yeah, alcohol does that. You get used to it.” Crowley looks around at the meagre things in his hut, looking for... There. He finds the sad loaf of bread he'd been offered with the wine, which he'd purchased along the jugs on a whim, with no true intention of eating it. “Here, have a nibble. It'll hit you hard if you're on an empty stomach.” 

Aziraphale takes the bread from Crowley, manoeuvring the jug under his arm. The demon huffs, a snide remark about selfish angels who sequester his booze and ‘didn’t you say human wine was the source of drunkenness?’ on the tip of his tongue, when he sees what the angel is doing.

Aziraphale breaks the bread, offering half of it to a stunned Crowley.

It doesn’t have to mean anything. Any other day, it wouldn’t have. Just two beings sharing a meal, as they’ve done before and will probably do again. But today, of all days?

“Sorry,” the angel says. There's a nervous rigidity to him, as he starts to withdraw his outstretched arm. “I thought perhaps you wanted some. I've noticed you don’t eat much, but-”

Crowley takes the bread. “Thank you.”

Aziraphale nods. Crowley nods back.

They eat, and they drink. After a while, the jugs seem to have multiplied, neither of them sober enough to know who was responsible for it. In the morning, a hungover demon will have to teach a much more hungover angel how to sober himself up, to avoid this happening the next time. 

“I doubt there'll be a next time,” Aziraphale says. 

“Of course,” Crowley agrees. 

The angel leaves. 

They are toasting to the first ever resurrection in human history three days later. 

Footnotes:

1. In truth, Crowley viewed Aziraphale as a true enemy once and only once before. In the Garden of Eden, watching the angel of the Eastern Gate while hiding in the tall grass, he remembers fearing what would become of him were he to be near that flaming sword. Curiosity won out in the end—of course it did, he never learns, does he?—and, five seconds into his conversation with Aziraphale, after realising he was not about to be smitten into oblivion, Crowley promptly erased all notions containing 'Aziraphale' and 'enemy' together from his brain. Return to text