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The early afternoon sun cast light over the city, mildly irritating pedestrians as it reflected on windows and the occasional discarded tin or bottle. There were many places in London used for quick meetings, but St James Park was one of the most obvious and well-known. Whether it was clandestine meetings, fraternising, or simply feeding the ducks - St James Park was a social hotspot. On this particular day, a month or two since the world failed to end, an angel and a demon were visiting the park to make good on a promise.
A checkered blanket was spread out on the grass, miraculously free of the bugs and grass usually characteristic of a picnic. Sunlight danced across the nearby water with far more grace than a demon could manage on the head of a pin. If one were to look closely, one might notice how the sunbeams avoided getting in a certain angel’s eyes and simply refused outright to shine a glare on the demon’s glasses, but none of the park-goers paid the two any mind.
Aziraphale dug around in a woven picnic basket as Crowley stretched his arms behind his back, apparently ignoring the physical limitations of human concepts like bones and joints.
“I must say, your work around the invention of meringues was quite ingenious,” Aziraphale said, carefully withdrawing a container of sugary monstrosities from the basket.
“Eh,” Crowley dithered. “I told Head Office that I was tempting the humans to inflict violence on unborn birds.”
Aziraphale paused. He much preferred purchasing baked goods rather than attempting to make them himself, but he knew enough about meringues to know how fervently one had to beat the egg whites.
“... and they believed you?”
“They don’t understand how baking works, angel. It’s too human for them.”
A punnet of strawberries and a jar of honey followed the meringues out of the basket.
“Surely they must know that the eggs humans consume aren’t actually fertilised?”
“Apparently not.”
Aziraphale assembled their desserts with a delightful smile on his face before pulling a bottle of wine and two glasses from the basket. There was no possible way that the bottle could have physically fit inside the basket, but a subtle glare from Crowley had the basket realising that perhaps it would be alright to ignore the rules of physics just this once.
Crowley took the two offered glasses and tilted the bottle with the practiced ease of someone who had been pouring wine since before bottles were invented, and perhaps before even the wine.
“What did make you decide to create meringues?” Azriaphale asked, accepting his glass. “I don’t recall you being particularly fond of sweets at the time.”
Crowley took a gulp of wine, ears flushed. He couldn’t outright say ‘Um, yeah, I invented meringues because I knew you’d love them. Oh, and they reminded me of how soft and white your hair is.’
“Er. Got bored, I suppose.”
“Well, I’m quite thankful, my dear boy.” Aziraphale smiled at Crowley in a way that made the sun feel woefully unqualified for its job before digging into his meringue and strawberries. Crowley picked at his slowly, for Aziraphale had been right in that he did not often eat sweets. Snakes weren’t fond of them, though they did hold a certain fondness for honey.
“Honey was one of yours, wasn’t it?” Crowley said.
“Um.” Aziraphale was suddenly deeply interested in the path of an ant as it wandered through the grass beside the picnic blanket.
“Course it was,” Crowley snickered. “I remember finding you up to your elbows in a hive of pissed-off bees.”
Aziraphale huffed and met his eyes again before a smile snuck onto his face.
“Well, I was right, wasn’t I? They were hiding something.”
Crowley laughed, placing his bowl to one side so he could lie down on the blanket.
“Never change, angel.”
The demon took a few moments to shift around until he was comfortable, half-heartedly wishing for the contorting abilities he possessed as a snake.
“Besides,” Crowley added. “I didn’t invent invent meringues, just chatted with the chefs and planted the idea.”
“It was in the 1700s, wasn’t it, my dear boy?” Aziraphale licked some honey from his fingers. Crowley’s eyes pointedly did not linger on the sight.
“Ehhh. Sometime around then, I think.”
The angel and the demon fell into a quiet companionship that spoke of their thousands of years together. The nearby ducks were quite put out that the two had not offered them any food, but decided that just this once they would let them off. After all, it wasn’t every day that Armageddon was averted, and Aziraphale and Crowley looked like they could use a break. Besides, St James’ duck population had been observing the two for centuries, watching their unresolved feelings get thrown around like particularly complicated dodgeballs. A picnic together was a step in the right direction, and the ducks didn’t want to miss a second of it.
“That was scrumptious,” Aziraphale said, wiping at the corner of his mouth with a napkin. He glanced at the sky, which was growing steadily overcast as the London weather made an appearance. “I suppose we’d best get going. Wouldn’t want to be caught in the rain, after all.”
“Never did understand why the humans found dancing in the rain romantic of all things,” Crowley said. His deft hands quickly folded the blanket as Azirpahle packed the basket away. The two could have miracled them away, but it was nice to do it the human way. “I always figured they’d catch a cold, stuck in the rain like that.”
“Humans aren’t quite as cold-blooded as you, though,” Aziraphale pointed out. “Being a snake hardly helps.”
“Fair point.”
The two stood, Crowley with the blanket over his arm and Aziraphle with the basket. As they made their way out of the park in the direction of the parked Bentley, the ducks were pleased to note that they walked closer together than they had let themselves be in a long time.
“I can take that if you want, angel,” Crowley said, holding out his hand for the picnic basket. “You don’t need to carry - ngk.”
Crowley was cut off Aziraphale’s hand slipped into his own. Hand. Two hands. Hands touching?? Aziraphale was holding his hand. Fuck. Crowley’s brain short-circuited as his body tried and failed to remember how to function. Fortunately, his way of walking rather relied on his sprawling limbs and thus Aziraphale did not notice anything amiss.
Crowley’s cheeks turned a shade of red that complimented his hair, and not even his sunglasses could hope to hide the way the blush spread across his face and touched the tips of his ears.
“Let’s be off, then,” Aziraphale said. “I rather thought I might tempt you to a spot of lunch. I hear there’s a new Italian restaurant that’s opened up a few streets over from the bookshop.”
“Er.”
Crowley’s legs stopped moving and Aziraphale was abruptly stopped by their joined hands. Crowley’s eyes were fixed on their hands, his mind working tremendously hard to continue existing instead of simply reverting to his True Form and slithering into a hole somewhere to continue his existential crisis. Aziraphale gave him a quizzical look before smiling.
“Are you coming, my dear? I think a table has just miraculously come free.”
My dear. Crowley let himself be pulled past the parked Bentley as Aziraphale led him on foot towards the restaurant. Aziraphale had said ‘my dear’. Not ‘my dear boy’ or ‘my dear fellow’ - my dear.
Crowley would deny the smile overtaking his face if anyone were to ask, but luckily for him, Aziraphale was the only one to see it. And the ducks, of course, but it wasn’t like they would tell anyone. As the angel and the demon left St James Park in the direction of the bookshop, Azirphale mentally patted himself on the back for a job well done.
His plan had worked perfectly.