Chapter Text
It was dark in the bookshop when Aziraphale blinked himself awake, the pearl-grey darkness of just before.dawn. Apparently the lamps, baffled at the unprecedented spectacle of a sleeping shopkeeper, had chosen to turn themselves off rather than disturb his slumber.
This reclining armchair that Crowley had conjured up was remarkably comfortable. Aziraphale briefly considered keeping it, but alas, it would clash awfully with the aesthetic of the rest of the shop.
Besides, perhaps, the comfort came from the sweetly snoring demon curled up on his chest.
Aziraphale glanced down at said demon, who had somehow managed to wriggle beneath his chin, around his stomach, under his elbows, between his knees, and into every accessible nook of his own corporation. His hair was a snarled mess, his cheek creased and smushed, and his mouth slack.
He was impossibly beautiful.
He -- they -- were wearing not a stitch (except for, between them, two and a half socks), and were sweaty and sticky and practically glued together. A quick snap took care of the unfortunate residue, although the slight sting of holiness led Crowley to stir grumpily. Aziraphale petted his hair, gently carding out the worst of the tangles, and the demon smacked his lips and snuggled back into place.
As for himself... well, his Effort was still present, half-hard against his thigh; but Aziraphale was sure that he could now easily banish it with a thought. He didn't want to. Not yet. He hoped to continue enjoying the faint sensation of sleepy arousal for just a little longer. He wanted to pretend that this was something more than an obligation. That the demon was offering something beyond his assistance with a pesky curse that Aziraphale had blundered into by his own carelessness.
That Crowley... well, that Crowley wasn't what he was. That he was someone with the capacity to return all the fondness, passion (and very well, love) that Aziraphale felt for him.
That he could actually mean all the lovely words he had uttered the night before.
Except... the angel frowned. Except that it wasn't like Crowley to say things that he didn’t believe. Not even for a temptation.
Crowley might omit facts he didn't like. He might shade the truth to fit his preferences. But Crowley did not lie to Aziraphale. Ever. Under any circumstances.
And there was that intense something just before ... before the curse was lifted. It was odd, and in a flavour he had never tasted before, but the angel knew that sensation.
Oh.
It was love.
Certainly not Her love, which was immense, endless, and life-giving, but also remote and a bit impersonal. Nor the pellucid, piercing, icy love of angels. And nothing like the messy, complicated, multi-faced and self-contradictory love of humans.
This love burned hot, slightly charred around the edges, with an acerbic twist; but it was also pure, strangely innocent, and as unshakeable as adamant.
It felt... it felt like Crowley.
How this could be possible, Aziraphale didn't know. Why he had never said anything... well, the angel didn't know that, either, but his own casual dismissal of any potential feelings over the centuries surely played a part. Fallen, he had said. Evil. He's not my friend. I don't know him.
"Oh my darling," he whispered to the demon snuffling into his neck. "For how long?"
Crowley didn’t answer, of course, which was probably for the best. Aziraphale wasn’t sure that his guilty conscience could bear to learn.
The more he gazed at his beloved man-shaped Serpent, the more he realised that – for all the passionate intimacies they had indulged in the night before – there was one line that they still had not crossed. Perhaps, he thought, with the clarity of new awareness, they had both instinctively shied away from it. Too painful. Too vulnerable. Too personal.
And for all those reasons and more, Aziraphale suddenly knew that if he didn’t take this opportunity to kiss Crowley just once, he might very well discorporate on the spot.
He shouldn’t. Crowley was still asleep. Crowley couldn’t give permission.
Crowley was right there.
Aziraphale crooked his neck to press his lips against the demon’s temple, upon his snakey tattoo.
“Zrphl,” Crowley muttered. “Ngl. Mrrr.”
Choosing to interpret that last as Yes, please, kiss me some more, Aziraphale dropped a dozen chaste kisses on that dear face: on his forehead, his cheeks, his eyelids, the crease of his nose, the corner of his mouth. Then, after pausing for a breath, he cupped his jaw in both hands and kissed Crowley full on the lips.
Crowley kissed him back.
Aziraphale slid his hands into the demon’s hair, pulling him close, kissing him all the while. He parted his lips, and breathed into Crowley’s mouth all the devotion and care and adoration he had kept locked inside himself for so long. And Crowley was kissing him back, so sweetly, so tenderly, so passionately, making darling little mmph-mm sounds, until he opened his lovely eyes and focussed on the angel, and …
…startled back so abruptly that he toppled onto the floor. “Fuck!”
The angel peered over the edge of the chair, fully intending to tease his silly serpent for his over-reaction. The merriment died before he could express it, though, as he caught sight of Crowley’s horrified expression.
“Sorrysorrysorry ‘m sorry, angel!” he babbled. His golden eyes were filled with more terror than Aziraphale could ever recall seeing. He abruptly rolled over so he was facing the floor. “Guess I, I, I, uh, was dreaming of corrupting an angel,” he stated in a carrying voice. He shivered, and twisted his body upright. “Not that I succeeded, no chance of that,” he shouted up at the ceiling.
“It’s all right, dear boy, it’s fine,” Aziraphale tried to reassure him.
It didn’t seem to register. Crowley scrabbled away crab-fashion, then seemed to notice his own nakedness. He snapped frantically, spinning his normal outfit about him from the ether, slipping his dark glasses over his face with a relieved grimace.
Sighing, Aziraphale gathered up his own clothing, donning them in a more conventional fashion. As each layer went on, like a shield, like armour, Crowley visibly relaxed. “I cannot thank you enough for your assistance with that curse, my dear,” the angel said, tightening his bowtie against his throat.
“That’s right, you can’t,” Crowley said, still a bit jittery. “In fact, you can’t thank me at all.”
“Understood.” Aziraphale stood forlorn, the modified chair still between them. Crowley gestured, and it returned to its previous shape. “But I will remember, nonetheless.”
Crowley didn’t say anything; he just hunched his shoulders and thrust his hands in those ridiculously tight pockets. Finally he glanced away and muttered, “Should burn that stupid spellbook.”
“No.” His voice was sharper than he wanted, and the demon flinched. “No,” he said more softly. “I will ward it carefully, so it cannot cause further mischief. But you never know. There might come a day when… when it might be useful again.” Airaphale smiled sadly. “Besides, as you are well aware, it is impossible to unlearn a thing, once learned.”
“Right.” Crowley jerked his chin up. “Right. Pity, that.”
“Is it?” Aziraphale challenged him.
Crowley met his gaze for several long moments. “Maybe not,” he conceded. “You take care, angel.”
Then he was gone, the bell over the bookshop door barely jangling. Aziraphale stood unmoving, listening to the fading growl of the Bentley’s engine, and waited for the sun to rise on another day.
***
Decades later
"Aha! So that's where you've got to, you wily thing!" Aziraphale pulled a leather-bound grimoire off of the top shelf where it had lurked, invisible behind several other similar volumes. "Wards quite unbroken, I see." He blew cobwebs off the cover with a little trepidation, even though he knew the book (and its cursed dust mites) had been under hermetic seal for many years.
(Literally. Aziraphale had not wasted the years he spent with the Egyptian priests of the Trismegistus.)
It would not be accurate to say that he had forgotten this spellbook, or the ...momentous... events it had triggered. How could he? But he had tucked the memories, and the revelations that went with them, into a special side pocket of his angelic consciousness, where he would have to go to not inconsiderable trouble to retrieve them. It would have been ten times as distracting – and fraught – as the original curse, otherwise.
And what with the delivery of the Antichrist and the imminent End of the World and the ineffable averting of Armageddon and whatnot, he could not afford for his attention to be divided.
But that was all in the past now.
Now, he could permit himself to remember.
So he sat down on the floor of the bookshop, surrounded by nearly-empty shelves and dozens of boxes filled with neatly-packed books, and lay the grimoire in his lap, letting his fingers lightly dance over the arcane symbols tooled in the black leather.
He was so caught up in his own thoughts (leaving a wry reminiscent twist to his expression) that he didn't notice that he wasn't alone until a slim hand gently tapped his shoulder.
"Almost done?" The long fingers gripped him a little more tightly. "Blast it, angel, you promised not to start re-reading anything until we got this whole gallimaufry delivered to the cottage!"
"I wasn't reading. I was just ..." Aziraphale smiled up into the aggrieved face of his beloved demon. "Do you remember this one, my dear? And all the kerfuffle it caused?"
"Kerfuffle? What does that even-- oh, is that that spellbook? I don't think I ever saw it in the first place. " Crowley scrubbed his face with his free hand. "But yeah, it's hardly something that I'd forget."
"It seems almost quaint now, doesn't it? How awkward it all was. So embarrassing. I hurt you dreadfully, dearest." He put his own hand over the one still pressing on his shoulder, and squeezed.
“Ehh. Old news.” Crowley looked mortified. “Don’t start apologising again. It’s humiliating.”
“If you insist. But I couldn’t possibly have displayed less, well, grace. Afterwards, I mean.” The angel dropped a gentle kiss on the tips of those fingers. "You were so terrified. You ran away."
"Didn't."
"Did. I didn't see you again for months."
"Well, if I did, you can hardly blame me, can you?" Crowley sat down on the floor and put his arm around the angel. "Thought that ... Dunno. That I might have caused you to Fall. Or that you would never speak to me again. Couldn't decide which was worse."
"Oh, darling." Aziraphale lay his head against his demon's chest. "As if I could ever stay away from you. That was when I realised that you loved me, you know. That you weren't just being kind. I will never forgive myself for being such an idiot for so long."
"Don't talk rot," Crowley said gruffly. "T'was awfully hot, though. Prime wank fodder for years. You have no idea."
"I might," Aziraphale teased, looking up through his lashes.
Crowley hummed. "We-e-ll. You've hung onto the thing for all this time. Be a shame to waste it." He shoved the angel with his shoulder, playfully. "We could always give it another go."
"Mmm-hmm. We might." Aziraphale gave him a little shove back. "But you know, I don't think we need any additional help in that department, do you?" He wiggled in place. “Scarcely takes any extra Effort at all.”
“Nope.” Crowley popped the ‘p’. “That’s ‘cause I’m a good old-fashioned lo-”
“Don’t say it,” Aziraphale warned.
“Your wish,” the demon dropped a kiss on the top of his head, “is my command.”
END