Chapter Text
~*~
“There you are!”
Aziraphale blinks, disoriented still. One second, he remembered tucking himself into bed, spine aching from too may years spent in his reading chair. Little Mary had been reading her favourite story, Pinocchio, to him. Such a bright young girl. So smart. Able to read aloud so fluently at the age of seven. And the next second – well.
“It took AGES this time, angel. I considered reincarnating early so we’d meet again because I’ve been so BORED.”
Crowley, one moment a heap of black and crimson coils wrapping around the massive apple tree in the middle of the Bookshop Garden, slithers to the ground and transforms back into the familiar shape Aziraphale had known for millennia.
Unable to comprehend what Crowley had just said, Aziraphale tries to sort out the billions of memories that rain down on him, restored once more. New ones, ancient ones, human and celestial lives, always finding and losing and finding Crowley again. Time after time.
Aziraphale presses the balls of his hands against his temples, needing a moment to settle back into his celestial form. The one that feels so wonderfully painless and light. Goodness gracious, growing that old really takes a toll on human bodies.
“I- uh- gosh, I’m still a bit woozy,” he mutters while the memories slowly settle into place. And then he gasps.
“Oh. OH.”
His eyes, pricking with tears, fall on Crowley again.
“Oh my darling, you died so early in this one!”
He vividly remembers the day in 1917, when the letter arrived that his beloved companion with the shiny copper hair and the most admirable freckles had fallen at the war front at only 24.
Crowley’s lips suddenly quiver and Aziraphale is in his arms before he knows it. The press of the former demon’s corporation is warm and Aziraphale reciprocates tightly.
“S’what happens to young men in war. Die quite before their time. Missed you, angel,” Crowley grumbles and holds him closer.
“And there I thought I’d be the one to go, first given the age difference. You waited quite long to incarnate. What was it? Twenty years?”
“Eighteen! And’s not like 've had any saying in the exact timing, eh?”
It was a curious thing, that even when they decided to go for another human life, they never seemed to be born at the same time.
Crowley chuckles and takes Aziraphale’s face into his hands, golden eyes shining with tears and mirth.
“You turned 102, you’d probably outlived me anyways!”
Aziraphale chuckles, his hands holding onto a slim waist. He ought to be sad. His human incarnation had grieved his beautiful, dapper Anthony for almost six decades. Their shared time had been too short. Four years between the shy veteran and London’s most wealthy bachelor were nothing, even for human standards.
But it had happened multiple times now. And every time, they found themselves back in this pocket between the universes, unscathed and them again, finally able to spend enough time catching up and reminisce.
Crowley suddenly froze, frowning.
“You had another partner and it wasn’t me!”
Blinking, Aziraphale leans away a bit, still holding onto the demon’s waist for balance. Crowley didn’t really seem upset.
“What did you expect me to do? Stay all alone for almost sixty years?” the former angel asked, memories of a life shared with Marcus, his two sons, their seven grandchildren and sweet Mary, thei great-granddaughter flashing before his inner eye. Oh, they must be all very upset. Aziraphale would miss them.
“I loved him, you know? Not like I loved you, obviously! You were always on my mind, ever since—”
He stops talking, because Crowley is looking at him like that again. Like every time former partners that weren’t the other came up. Or their families. Or even the children they both had had. That gentle I-know-and-it’s-aright-smile.
“I’m glad you got him. Would’ve been a shame if you spent your life all the way to 102 sulking for boring old me, eh?”
Aziraphale scoffed at the former demon, sending him a warm smile.
“You’re not boring!”
“So why did you take so long, then?”
There’s neither accusation nor malice in the former demon’s tone, head cocked playfully. Aziraphale rolls his eyes, unable to hide the joy of seeing his beloved Crowley once again.
“Will you keep carping or are you going to kiss me already?” he teases and Crowley sends him a smile full of teeth.
“You bet,” he drawled, and pulled Aziraphale in.
Ezra Zariah Fell • 1876-1978
Anthony James Crowley • 1894 – 1917