Chapter Text
The London streets were as busy as ever, though Aziraphale didn’t notice the sound of strangers’ footsteps. Only the familiar swing of Crowley’s step by his side. The day had rolled into night, the sun disappearing behind the city skyline, until they wandered through the darkness, the end of the first day of the rest of their lives.
It was no different than any day they’d spent before. They had walked back to his bookshop from the Ritz hundreds of times, these pavements held the history of their feet over centuries, grooved like leylines into the Earth. Yet today his heart felt like a bird was caught on the edge of its nest, waiting for the first moment it would leap into the unknown and catch flight.
The walk was too short, not even 15 minutes, 20 minutes tops if they took their time. They were happily tipsy, not stumbling drunk, but enough that they had walked so close their cuffs would brush as they turned a corner.
With each step he could feel Crowley pulling back, slowing, as if walking against a gale force wind. By now they were past the eyesores of the Burger Kings, and Pret a Mangers that littered the London streets.
He wondered if any had ever noticed how those shops faded away the closer they came to his shop. There were no large ramen bowls from Wagamamas, no peri peri chicken from Nandos; Aziraphale was sure that Crowley probably had a hand in these restaurants swarming around London like aphids on a lettuce leaf.
But not here, in his small haven.
As the bookshop came into sight, Aziraphale brogues dug hard into the concrete. Once he passed through that door he was left unmoored, compassless, and his North star was as adrift as he was.
They could continue the night; it would not be uncommon for them to drink until the dawn chorus of men and women in suits would wake up.
But there was something different tonight. The day had wrung them both dry, body swapping, the threats on Crowley’s life, they had laughed about it, but in the cold dead of night, it felt altogether more real. This thing between them - the idea that there was ever a world in which they could exist without the other.
“I suppose this is good night,” Aziraphale said, even though they both knew it was. It was a silly thing to say, but words failed him. They stood by the door. Crowley leaned back on the bookshop wall, his hips cocked as usual, strange to think only earlier Aziraphale had been in charge of those errant joints.
“Are you busy next week at all?” Crowley said.
“Hm?”
“Got any plans?”
“No, I suppose not, I was thinking I could do some inventory.”
“Thrilling.”
“I have a lot of first editions that need shelving. You?”
“Could re-alphabetise my records, I suppose.”
“That sounds rather like inventory.”
“Yes, but my version makes things easier to find.”
“We’d have an awful time if we ever brought our collections together,” Aziraphale said without thinking, he felt his cheeks warm under the cool summer air.
“Could be good way to to pass the time? You can mess it all up and I’ll organise it, probably keep us busy, for say, another thousand years?”
“Yes, there is a lot of time ahead, isn’t there?”
“So, no plans?” Crowley said.
“No nothing. For the rest of the universe.”
“Seems like it. What about Friday?” Crowley scuffed his toes into the cracked pavement, he looked down, averting his gaze, though there was no need when he was still wearing his sunglasses. Aziraphale wondered how he ever walked in a straight line past 10pm.
“Yes, of course. The inventory can wait.”
“Lunch then? Or dinner? Drinks? There’s got to be some awful show that you will sit rapt for in the whole of London, or I suppose we don’t have to stay here, could pop across the Channel, or even further. Surely there’s got to be something to do on this planet, and if not there’s always Alpha Centauri."
Aziraphale dared to place a hand on Crowley’s arm to steady him. It worked, the demon froze, raising his gaze up to meet his.
“Sounds wonderful. 7pm?”
“Sure.” Crowley slouched back. “You can make the reservations.”
Aziraphale quirked an eyebrow.
“If I do them, you’ll change them all anyway.”
“Touche,” Aziraphale let himself smile. “Friday it is."
It was strange this new world, for the first time in his existence, the panic that he had become accustomed to had been turned down to a simmer. In its place new feelings bubbled up instead, scents and sounds that he had long tried to hide from.
He watched for only a minute as Crowley walked away.
Aziraphale stood in front of the mirror, which he should really get around to dusting, holding two bowties in his hands. To the less discerning eye they might look identical but Aziraphale was aware that there was a subtle different shade in the tartan that made his eyes shift colour when paired with a certain shirt.
These were the types of knowledge one acquired after 6,000 years of wrangling with human fashion. The truth was he wasn’t sure why he was spending so much time picking a bowtie, it was merely an accessory after all, yet he held them limp in his hands, unable to choose, as if they were about to jump up and strangle him.
Dressing for meeting Crowley was not an activity that normally filled him with such dread, but there was something different tonight. The days had slogged by, almost feeling like the years they had spent not speaking. He had considered coming up with some excuse to call the demon, some fake injury or bookshop related accident that would bring the Bentley tyres screeching by the door.
However, he was sure, knowing Crowley, that he had curled up into bed and was only rising now to pour himself into some ridiculous outfit. He was not standing by a mirror holding two bowties with the abject panic of a man caught knee deep in quicksand.
“Hey, angel?” An echo from downstairs bounced through the hallway, Aziraphale grasped the left bowtie tight and dropped the other. His eyes would sparkle blue today, he hoped somewhere in the back of his mind that Crowley would appreciate that.
“You’re early,” he yelled back, smoothing the pomade through his hair. He looked good. He knew he did. It was a strange thing for an angel to know such things, vanity was a sin after all, though he supposed what did it matter anymore.
“Not had a lot on.” Crowley bellowed, Aziraphale stared at the door. This would be far easier if he invited Crowley upstairs, but the idea of the demon crossing the threshold of his bedroom filled him with a feeling he could not name. It wasn't as if his bedroom was at all meaningful to him, not like humans where all sorts of deeds could be kept behind closed doors.
The bookshop had always felt like neutral ground. A liminal space for them both. The Bentley too. A staging ground where shades of grey could blur.
The flat upstairs was his. After years of moving from place to place, from drifting from caves to lodging houses, to that awful era where he lived briefly in a tent, he had found a place that was entirely his own. While he had technically needed their approval to keep the bookshop as a Heavenly outpost, the angels seemed to forget about the upstairs.
It was small; he knew that for humans it was the perfect size for a bachelor, though of course he never really saw himself as such. The kitchen was compact, the oven door would hit the wall if opened too rigorously, something he learned during his scone-baking phase in lockdown.
The walls were the same shade of yellow, but up here, where the windows loomed larger, it shone so much brighter. It was the colour of stars, and sunlight, and it kept him tethered in a way that nowhere else ever had.
The bedroom was large enough for a double bed; ornate brass carvings of flowers along the iron wrought bedposts. He had found that at night, especially in winter, that curling under the large duck feathered duvet with a cup of freshly brewed Twinings was as close to comfort as he had ever known.
“Are you ready or what?” Crowley's voice was getting louder, and Aziraphale’s muscles tensed. Was he coming up the stairs? Some part of him longed to let the demon into this part of his life, and another felt it was far too soon, too rushed, he quickly tied the bowtie knot and came out to the landing. Crowley was standing at the bottom of the stairs, one foot hovering on the step, though even he looked unsure, as if he was breaking some code they had never explicitly set out.
He was looking as brilliant as always, wearing black jeans that looked like they had been painted on, his hair coiffed and effortless, his tutleneck that left little to the imagination, but the part that hit Aziraphale in the chest was that smile. Crowley dazzled with it.
“You can wait a few minutes, surely,” Aziraphale said, as he descended. Then they were back in neutral ground, the safety restored. “Let me get my coat.”
There was nothing special about this restaurant from the outside, which was precisely why Aziraphale liked it. Most people would have walked past this Lebanese and thought nothing of it, the type of place that was quiet enough to always have a table and yet busy enough to have an atmosphere, where an angel and demon could slip into a table unnoticed by passers-by.
Crowley and Aziraphale had been coming here for years, so much so that they should be regulars, however a flick of the wrists and a heavy tip had ensured their service was exquisite and their faces unremarkable The owner was sure that they were important customers, he could never quite remember why.
The only time it was a bother was when Crowley had overreached after two many BYOBs and the waiter was sure that Aziraphale was a famous food critic, bringing him every dish under the sun, and refusing to leave them alone for more than two minutes at a time. Even Aziraphale became exhausted as yet another plate of rich baba ghanoush was piled in front of him every time he tried to exchange a single word.
Since then they had learned a more dampened approach was good for everyone.
The last time they’d been here, Crowley had tugged off his Nanny tights and Aziraphale had washed the soil from his fingers. They’d mused the various points of Warlock’s upbringing and finished it off with a baklava.
Aziraphale smiled as he remembered notebooks pushed to the side, plotting forgotten, Crowley’s elbow resting on the table, edging ever closer to him, as if drawn in like matter to a black hole.
The smells were divine, or better yet, not divine at all. Humanity had long surpassed the sterile meals in Heaven. Instead they found richness in every bite, with textures that crunched, and sweetness that sang on the tongue. Aziraphale dipped freshly baked pita into the hummus, the oil glistening across the speckled chickpea. With one bite he was transported back, thousands of years, robes and desserts, a time before bookshops.
Their history spilled across the table in front of him, and he could not help looking up fondly as Crowley swirled his wine.
“How’s retirement treating you?” Crowley poured Aziraphale a glass of red he had found in the back of the bookshop cupboard.
“It’s only been a week, Crowley.”
“Really? Feels longer, don’t you think?”
“Surely you slept the whole time?”
“Tried to, dreams been a bit heavy recently.”
“You dream?”
“You don’t?”
“I have an occasional nap.”
“Bet it’s all harmonious kum bah hah-ing for angels. Less brimstone and fire.”
“I don’t know what that means."
“Peace and love, angel.”
“It’s not sunshine and rainbows, and you know that.”
“No, sometimes it is floods and lightning bolts.” The restaurant was warm, the wallpaper was a faded auburn, the corner where they sat was dark enough that Crowley had dared to take off his sunglasses.
“Probably not any big ones anymore. Not for a while I hope. I suppose even if there is, I’m off duty. I do hope I don’t need to get on another boat.”
“Think you will be alright with that?”
“Hm?” Aziraphale said, popping a falafel into his mouth, he raised his eyebrows mid groan.
“Letting all the bad things happen and not doing anything about it.”
“I didn’t do that because it was my job. I do believe in righteousness.”
“Yes, but why bother when it’s not?”
“Are you not itching for some demonic deeds when you’re off the clock? Going to what, get drunk and knock off all the internet for Camden? Build a tube station that works as a part time Hell Mouth? Or perhaps whoopie cushions in the seats of Parliament, that type of thing?”
“I would have thought you’d think more highly of me than that, angel. Thumbtacks at least.” Crowley’s finger circled the wine glass. “Hadn’t thought about it. Maybe I’ll take up a new hobby. Get a job.”
“Where could you possibly work?”
“I don’t know, whatever humans do. I have been moonlighting as a human for years. Can’t be that hard, can it? Strategising or Growth Hacking.”
“I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“And that is the point.” Crowley raised his finger into the air.
“You don't need a job, you have all the money you could ever want. We both do.”
“Right.”
“You could help in the shop.” The words tumbled out of Aziraphale’s mouth before he could stop them. Crowley blinked, swallowing the wine in a large gulp.
“Doing what?”
“I don’t know. Scaring people away, the damp smell can only do so much.”
“Do I get to manage the damp smell or will it be my superior?”
“I’ll have to consider restructuring,” Aziraphale lowered his voice, conspiratorially, “I nearly made the dust employee of the month, but I fear it has been slacking of late.”
Aziraphale leaned back smug; happy to have pulled a laugh from Crowley’s lips.
“So, you need help?”
“No, not really. But it would be nice to see you, you can pop by anytime.” Aziraphale wasn’t sure why he said that. Crowley had been popping by the bookshop since it first opened its door. He was as much apart of the furniture as the wing back armchairs and the creaky bookshelves.
“Not too busy for company?”
“Quite the opposite.” He did not say that the last week had opened like a chasm in front of him; that the days felt too long, too unfilled. He didn’t miss being an angel, exactly. That would be the wrong word, being an angel had always filled him with a level of anxiety that he was frankly glad to be rid of.
But there was something missing; a future without purpose that stretched in front of him like an endless horizon. One could stop people buying books for years, but that hardly seemed like a fitting way to spend eternity.
“Unless you're busy?” Aziraphale asked, because Crowley was staring at the table cloth, worrying a thread absently between his fingers. He sat back in the chair, any human might have toppled back at this point, but Crowley's centre of gravity tended to do what he told it to.
“No, no, not at all. I could come and whip that dust into shape. You know, it's been there since the 1800s, angel. You could give it a holiday.”
“And where does dust go on holiday?”
“Wouldn’t want to send it to the beach, it would probably get lost.”
“Perhaps, they visit long lost relatives in The Valley of the Kings.”
They were smiling again. They were doing a lot of that today. Easy grins over the low shadow, caught up in each other. Aziraphale liked it. He was having fun, and the wide expanse, as terrifying as it was, did allow for this. For it to be filled with something new, of a friend, a true friend.
One he no longer had to spend days wringing his hands about spending time with.
“Why don’t we make it a regular thing?” Crowley said, this time he looked up and there were hopeful creases around his eyes.
“What? Like the Arrangement?”
“Yes, but less work-y. You’re bored. I’m bored. Might as well spend time together.”
“I can find things to do.”
“There are only so many ways you can rearrange a book collection into an impossible system.”
“That’s what you think.”
“Fridays? 7pm? Every week.”
Aziraphale caught the glimmer in Crowley’s eyes, perhaps this would be enough. A way to scratch the itch that was forming in his belly.
“I think that is a splendid idea.”
“Excellent.” Crowley picked up a glass and Aziraphale raised his own.
They had clinked their glasses so many times over the years. Aziraphale even remembered the first time Crowley had shown him how; back then it had felt rebellious, an act against Heaven and Hell.
Back then, it had been a symbol of them working apart from the systems they had found themselves in; a knowing glance that only they knew how to read.
Now, it felt worn in, a ritual they performed without thinking. He wasn’t sure when it happened, when they had become so entwined in each other, when the demon had become as comfortable as a warmed cup of tea in his hands.
Strange how it happens.
“What are we toasting?” Aziraphale said.
“To us?”
Aziraphale bit his lip, ignoring the rising heat that rose from his toes.
“To retirement.”