It happens 3 years after the world continues (the angel had preferred the flowery term 'the world began anew', while Crowley more cynically termed it 'the world found a new last leg': they had compromised, as usual) on Little Christmas Eve in a small town in Austria. Or maybe it's Italy; they're close to the border on one side or the other, and anyway what really appeals about it is – mountains.
Crowley had coerced (tempted) Aziraphale away from the bookshop like this:
"What's the point of staying? To make sure the door stays closed? It's against the law to open on Christmas, you know that." He shot a friendly grin to the last customer of the day, who responded with a look of pure terror before shoving the book they'd been examining haphazardly onto a shelf and fleeing the shop, letting in a gust of cold wind and the sound of nearby traffic and far off voices. Crowley allowed himself a moment of pride – his smile had achieved in a few seconds what the angel's stern glare had been trying (and failing) to do for the past half hour. Or it could have been the sunglasses in December – apparently they gave off a 'psychopath vibe'. But he decided to go with the smile.
"The law?" Aziraphale preened too – oh, the precious thing, he thought his glaring had finally paid off. "Surely you know I answer to a higher moral code than human shopkeepers."
"Well, by all means, open up, if you think you'll be getting any customers on Christmas Day. Which you won't. And you wouldn't sell them anything if you did."
The angel raised an eyebrow and examined Crowley from behind his spectacles. He sighed.
"But Crowley, why the Dolomites? I don't mind the snow, of course, but a cold-blooded creature like you just doesn't belong in the cold. What's wrong with Irish coffee in the back room, like every other year?"
Another (dare he say devilish) grin: "Mountains."
"That had better not mean avalanches, darling, you know they always rub me up the wrong way, and I do hate to start the New Year off –"
"Wrongly rubbed?" The comment earned Crowley another glare. "Well I can guarantee no casualties, that's just tacky – but who am I to stand in the way of natural disasters and the inconvenience they cause? What do your insurance people call them? Acts of God?"
Aziraphale's brow wrinkled. "Insurance? They're definitely not ours, the interfering… so-and-sos." He gave another weary sigh. It sounded like a refusal, but Crowley had known the angel for enough millennia to recognise when he had him on side. "Well I suppose, if I can't make you promise to behave, I'll have to tag along to keep an eye on you." Jackpot. "Dreadful nuisance, but I suppose the change of scenery might be pleasant."
"Ooh yes, angel, think about all those books you wouldn't be selling regardless! What a loss!"
"Do shut up, dear, before I change my mind."
So here they are, December 23rd, in a bustling Christmas market in a rural town that could only be described as (and honestly, they'd had an hour long row trying to find another word, to no avail) cute. Clock towers and quaint little stores rest in the timeless contended shadow of the winter night. Cheerfully busy crowds throng the small cobbled streets, wrapped up safely against the cold. Aziraphale has donned a knobbly knitted yellow scarf, a cream-coloured knitted hat with a bobble, and, against all laws of coolness (Crowley would say decency), mittens. He doesn't need any of this, technically speaking, he doesn't really feel the cold, but still somehow manages to have ridiculously rosy cheeks. Truth be told, very few words other than 'cute' could describe him either. Crowley, meanwhile, has bothered with none of this affectation, and is drawing stares from intrigued passers-by with his rolled shirt-sleeves and bare neck. The sunglasses are less of a talking point than usual, so close to ski slopes and their eccentric occupants.
Crowley whispers something threateningly to the giant fir tree at the entrance to the town square, and it stands to attention immediately. "What lovely foliage," remarks the angel, oblivious.
The evening conversation consists of the usual good vs. evil banter. What has become predictable and routine (words usually anathema to the demon) is comfortable and pleasant. It's strange, he thinks absently, that I don't get bored. Strange, but not bad. Sausages are a point of contention ("They have to be ours, they're scrumptious!"/ "Would heaven really invent anything stuffed in an intestine lining, angel? Not to mention what's in them. What kind of a word is scrumptious, anyway?"/ "How would you describe them, then?"/ "…"/ "Exactly. Now, eat up, and shut up, darling") as are stuffed animal toys, carol singers, and xylophones.
The one stall they definitely both approve of is the one selling delicious, piping hot mulled wine ("Call it Gluhwein, dear, it was your idea to go continental this year, after all") by the generously-sized mug. Crowley and Aziraphale had reached a consensus long ago that something with the potential for such extremes of good and bad as alcohol could only be the work of humans, not that this determination was something they'd ever be reporting to their respective superiors. If there's one thing they can agree on, it's that drinking is a definite perk of the job. So they unceremoniously glug gallons of Gluhwein, as soft swirls of white begin to adorn the canopies of the surrounding stalls. Besides, celestial physics aside, it is bloody freezing.
The blush of cold on the angel's cheeks is slowly painted over with a flush of intoxication as the evening lingers on. Carol singers can be faintly heard in a nearby street, pleasing both drinkers with their presence for different reasons: equal parts irritating and endearing – much like his angel, Crowley thinks, with a fondness his demonic nature would usually stamp out. The part of his nature that plays… er, deity's advocate, however, is especially reactive to Gluhwein, it seems: it pipes up that this might, in fact, be the perfect opportunity to discuss his frequent mental use of 'my angel' rather than 'the angel' with his (the) angel himself, who may have some insight on the topic, or alternatively may simply enjoy a drunken snog, which, let's be fair, is why you dragged him up here in the first place, you idiot. In the amiable silence, Crowley patiently waits for the sensible part of him to cut in with a no, don't risk it, feelings are dreadfully messy things, not proper demon-like behaviour, and so on. It utterly fails to do so. He nudges his mind with a sip of wine, at which the sensible part of him drunkenly rolls over and slurs: "Go for it, son," before winking and disappearing below the rising tide of alcohol.
So instead of pursuing one of the many sensible options available to him (run away to Zurich; masquerade as the son of an unidentified skiing instructor; become an incompetent anaesthetist; maybe rent a jet ski) the demon removes his sunglasses, takes a deep breath, and chokes on a snowflake. The coughing fit that follows in entirely undignified, and has Aziraphale slapping the wooden counter with laughter. Crowley is too busy regaining the ability to breathe to glare at him, but comforts himself with the thought that schadenfreude can't be too popular a trait upstairs.
When he finally regains his composure (the angel still giggling like a child at – well, Christmas) he refuses to let the realisation dawn that yes, this is in fact an important thing, and decides to plough ahead half-cocked, an approach that, to be fair, has seldom failed him before. He also refuses to acknowledge that when it has failed him, it has failed him spectacularly.
"Aziraphale?" The angel, still smiling, looks up from his steaming mug. At the sight of Crowley's uncommonly worried face, his smile instantly disappears, to be replaced with a line between his eyebrows that somehow fits with his glasses and pink cheeks to make a picture, Crowley thinks, that belongs in an illustrated dictionary beside the word 'adorable'. He apparently thinks this more slowly than usual, however, as when he focusses again the angel is holding up fingers, apparently for him to count, which would be easy enough if there weren't a ghost hand flickering over the real one in his vision. Ah, so he's drunk. That he can handle.
"Angel, I'm going to sober up. And we're going to talk." He screws his eyes up painfully. Curse you, Aziraphale, and your stupid ghost hand!
The angel's brow creases further in confusion. "Haven't we been talking?" He turns a puzzled expression on his mug as though surprised to find it in his hand, and then glances up at Crowley looking like a lost puppy, an expression the demon has never really registered as anything more than a myth. He asks earnestly, "Should – Should I sober up?"
"No!" Now sober, Crowley re-evaluates Aziraphale's expression. Yep, still just like a lost puppy. "I just mean, I'd prefer you to be drunk for this so that, even though I know you'll remember, obviously, we can pretend this conversation never happened, if you don't – if you think I'm an idiot, or whatever, after." Apparently sobering up has done absolutely nothing for his conversational skills. His sensible part chooses this moment to interject: demons don't babble.
"Darling," the angel says, his voice slightly slurred, "either I'm very drunk, or what you just said made no sense. Or both. Yes," he asserts, raising a wobbling finger assertively, "I deduce that it is, in fact, both. So, if I can't make sense, you're going to have to sober up." He stares intently at nothing for a moment before continuing, "No, wait, that's wrong. You're already sober, and I always make sense. Or, at least, almost always. Or almost always more sense than you, you silly thing!" Aziraphale giggles, hiccups, sighs, and, charade over, settles back into the lost puppy look that Crowley finds he is still having zero luck withstanding.
"Okay, here goes –" Crowley closes his eyes, and tries to pretend that he's a baby playing peek-a-boo – nothing exists if I can't see it. It doesn't work. He's never played peek-a-boo, but if he had, he would have cheated. "We've been around, around each other, since… well, ages. Haven't we?" He cracks an eyelid open. Aziraphale is nodding warily. So far, so good. He retreats into darkness again. "So, well, you're the closest thing I have to a friend. So close, in fact, that I might go so far as to say that we are friends. You're my friend. Which means, considering that you are the only one of those I have, that on a scale, you'd take top spot – be my best friend, so to speak. Actually, by that counter, you'd also be my worst friend, but, er…" He trails off. That was an insufficiently smooth end note to risk checking the angel's expression, he thinks, so he soldiers on, "Well anyway, you know I call you angel, because… Er… You're an angel, and, so I call you that, an angel, with my mouth," once more veering dangerously off course Crowley, keep it together, "but obviously, if I think about you, when I think about you – of course I think about you, alright? Shut up! So – I call you the same thing, i.e. angel, in my mind. As I do with my mouth. Except, funny story, apparently my mental commentary is written in Microsoft Word or something, because 'the angel' always sort of autocorrects to 'my angel', and… and I'm not entirely sure it's in the completely platonic context of 'my best friend, who is an angel'…" His eyes snap open in panic. "But it could be that, if you want! I can add it to my mental dictionary, or something!"
In front of him, Aziraphale's eyes are narrowed. Surprise, confusion, even pity Crowley had feared, but the angel appears to be, bizarrely, extremely ticked off, and even worse, much less drunk than before. It suddenly seems very strange that his glare had failed to frighten the customer the other day. Crowley wants to turn tail and flee.
"I'm so sorry if I've misunderstood. You've been calling me angel, all this time… as a descriptor, yes?" Aziraphale's calm tone trembles almost imperceptibly. Crowley nods dumbly in response. "Alright. And now, when you call me angel, there is a measure of affection in the term, would it be fair to say? Which, for some reason, worries you?"
"Well, of course it does! We're… I don't… I don't have anyone else I'd take to dinner at the Ritz." It's a lame sentence to describe what he feels, Crowley realises, but he means it.
"Just so. Nor have I. Now, allow me to make one thing perfectly clear to you –", Crowley braces himself for the forthcoming disaster as Aziraphale inhales deeply, "– I don't call you 'darling' because you are one! And I never have, because you've never been one!" It should be impossible to look that angry and still be cute, but he's pulling it off somehow, "you are an arrogant prat, Crowley, not to mention a fool, and I am terribly fond of you! Obviously!"
Crowley takes a moment to examine the possibility that he's gone mad. Or, more likely, that he has been mad for some time and it's taken until now for the problem to reveal itself. He glances at the Gluhwein vendor, who is purposefully averting his gaze from the scene. Ah, so he really is being publicly berated for obliviousness in a Christmas market by an angel of the lord. Good to know.
"Um, Aziraphale –"
"I thought we'd done this! I thought we understood each other somewhat! How dare you make me feel like such a halfwit – and don't stand there looking like this is a goodbye argument, if you think I'm letting you out of this now that you've finally realised we're a couple, you're a bigger fool than I took you for already, and to recap, I think you are an enormous fool!" The bookseller huffs a stray hair out from behind his spectacles angrily.
"…we're a couple?"
"Evidently so."
"Oh. Well that's…" Crowley gropes around his mind for a suitable word, "good? I mean, it's good."
Aziraphale huffs again in response, and now his expression contains an ounce of hurt mixed in with all the rage. It's an ounce too much for Crowley. "Of course it's good. It's – I want that. And, apparently, I have that, so that's… the best outcome, really, from where I'm standing. I just wonder – and I understand that you are still furious with me, and rightly so – why, if this has already happened," and he suddenly sees that of course it has, that he's been thinking of the angel as his angel for the very simple reason that he is, "then why wasn't there, I don't know, a – a move, so to speak? Before this one that is, my extremely ineffectual one."
The (his) angel's nose crinkles as he considers a response. He sighs, expelling his anger with a translucent cloud of warm air. There is a moment of awkwardness. By this point, however, that could probably just be added to the running tally. "Well, simply put, I suppose, fools like you rush in where angels fear to tread. I… I wasn't sure what else you wanted, for one thing, and for another, I simply assumed that you would take it once you knew. That's always been your style." He smiles a little, fondly now, "so I came to the conclusion that you simply found outright intimacy distasteful. A little rashly, I now see."
"You thought… sorry, you thought I was fond of you but didn't, er, fancy you?" No need to worry old chap, you've gone mad, Crowley's sensible part purred, just roll with it.
Aziraphale's cheeks attempt a blush, but it barely adds anything to their already red hue. "Well, it didn't seem, well, overly surprising that you wouldn't want to engage in... anything, with this physical manifestation. Just – I'm not exactly cool." He shuffles bashfully. "I know coolness is important to you."
"You're more important to me than coolness!" Had he really just said that? Losing demon points by the second. "I mean, I want… I don't not want… I do fancy you. In addition to fondness." There's another awkward moment, but it's a good awkward, like the anticipation before anticipation itself.
"Physicality doesn't bother me either way, really, although…" Aziraphale shoots a look up at Crowley that, if he didn't know better, he would be tempted to call coy, "I have always been foolishly enamoured with the human romantic notion of… a kiss in the snow."
"Ah." Crowley shuts his eyes once more and opens them again, just to check. Yes, same angel looking at him as though he's the stupidest, most adorable thing in the universe. It's not a look he's seen before, but that being said, it's one he'd quite like to see again. And again. As many times as possible, really – it's a great look. He smiles. "In that case… we're going to need a little more Gluhwein." Now that's an even better look. He must investigate that, later.
For now, though, he twirls his angel out into the swirling snowfall. Against all logic, Aziraphale notices, a sprig of mistletoe is floating calmly in the air a foot above their heads. Against all logic, Crowley thinks, an angel and a demon are about to share a kiss in the snow.
"Don't you think it's awfully un-demonic to grant a Christmas wish to an angel?"
"I'd say it's terribly un-angelic to be tempted by a demon whilst tipsy."
"Well, my dear, we shall once again have to agree to disagree."
"As shall we always… my angel."