This is a sort of re-write of another one-shot from a while back. Warning for bondage, suspension, and consensual burial.
Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh …
Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh …
The sound of sand pouring around Crowley's body is like a long, soothing hush - a finger to his angel's lips as he tries to quiet the voices in his demon's brain.
Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh …
Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh …
It fills Crowley's ears, then his head, and slowly, like a well-worn eraser on a pencil too short to be sharpened any further, eliminates the comments made so many times they've left thick, dark lines inside his skull, stains that will never completely be removed - Hell's snide remarks; a ledger full of jokes made at his expense; vague threats that chase after him, catch up to him no matter how fast he drives; and, most importantly, his own vile thoughts, which he'll never be free of regardless of how many times Aziraphale whispers sweet words of praise in his ears.
Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh …
Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh …
Crowley isn't exactly sure where Aziraphale gets the sand from. He would assume Aziraphale miracles it in but that would be a difficult thing to explain to the higher ups - not that they have any say in what Aziraphale does with his magic anymore, but they're always poking their noses in where they don't belong. Crowley smiles at the conversation that might ensue if Archangels confronted Aziraphale now that the two of them are, for the most part, independent contractors.
"Aziraphale! Why in Heaven's name did you waste a miracle transporting seventy-five pounds of sand to your demon's flat?" Gabriel would ask, red-cheeked with anger, his eyes aflame with holy white light.
"Why? Why!?" Aziraphale would reply, squaring his shoulders and tugging down his waistcoat, his eyes not only alight with the same white flame, but consumed by it. "Fuck you, that's why!"
That's probably not how it would go down, but it makes Crowley feel a smidge better to imagine it that way.
Crowley suspects it's beach sand Aziraphale fills his body bag with.
Black volcanic sand.
It smells like all things summer - sunscreen, salt water, barbecue smoke, but also clean, fresh air kissed by sunshine. When he's in his human-form, Crowley is not too fond of sand. But his serpent side adores it. The sand retains heat, absorbing it, then redirecting it, transforming Crowley from shrunken and shivering in his own tense frame to relaxed.
Downright cozy.
It acts like a weighted blanket, the effect only mildly different. It builds. Instead of having ten, fifteen, twenty-five pounds rest on him all at once, it presses down on him gradually - one shovel full at a time until he's engulfed in calm. It's not like having Aziraphale's weight on top of him, Aziraphale's warmth surrounding him, his wings wound around him and tightening slowly. But it's still comforting.
The darkness of the bag he's curled inside of, the weight of the sand, it doesn't just bury him. It buries the voices that collect in his head, buzzing like flies drunk on honey. It buries his self-doubt in a place he can project on to so that it doesn't plant seeds inside him, grow and devour him. His successes and his failures get buried with him inside that bag, too. When he comes out, he'll get to decide which he wants to take with him and which he wants to leave behind.
With the help of his angel, who is always there to help guide him.
Crowley had been gone for days - off to only God knows where … if She cared to look. Aziraphale never troubles him for an explanation. Yes, they're married, but that doesn't mean much has changed.
Crowley's time is his own. As was Aziraphale's.
Aziraphale read and Crowley … did Crowley things.
When Crowley finally returned, Aziraphale expected a lighthearted and giddy demon to saunter into his bookshop bearing several crates of alcohol and a take away box of crepes, maybe devil's food cake.
Wine he did have. Crepes, too. But also a back bowed by burdens.
He muttered and paced and grumbled under his breath. He would sit, then immediately get up and walk a lap around Aziraphale's shop.
Everything was wrong, Aziraphale heard him say.
His flat was wrong.
His car was wrong.
The city was wrong.
His head was on wrong and everything inside him was wrong.
He may have gone down to Hell for a visit or a meeting or a whatever. Lord knows why he returns from time to time, but he does. But now that he's above ground again, everything is too bright, too loud, too sharp, too open, too much.
And Crowley can't handle it.
When Aziraphale asked his demon what he thought could help him, Crowley answered, "Soft, dark, quiet … alone."
It broke Aziraphale's heart to hear Crowley say he needed to be alone. He'd presumably just returned from time alone and now he wanted more of it. Though Aziraphale understands that time alone away from him and time alone with him in the same room are different concepts.
Still, Aziraphale missed his husband.
But he couldn't deny him anything.
And Crowley needed a re-set – one he couldn't find on his knees.
He needed to hide, disappear somewhere where the world couldn't find him.
This bag isn't some random item Aziraphale had lingering around his bookshop, a relic from the past that he kept alongside his snuff boxes and Bibles. He'd ordered it special - a tool to help Crowley with his anxiety. When Crowley had his first major attack and spoke about it with Aziraphale, he used words like open and big and lost and flailing to get his point across. Aziraphale concluded that Crowley needed to make his problems smaller than himself, and thus more manageable. He needed to restrict his thinking to the basics – yes and no, light and dark, good and bad, the building blocks that humans learn as children, and move on from there.
So, in essence, this bag is like a womb, a beginning which, as supernatural entities, they'd never been given. Crowley retreats to it when he needs to start over.
Sometimes Aziraphale envies him for it.
Crowley can't wear much when he's inside it. Just his underclothes. It forces him into the fetal position, muffles most external sounds. It's where he comes to terms with himself, reconnects with his thoughts either demonic or celestial, before he joins the world again.
Aziraphale bid his husband good-bye with a kiss before Crowley climbed in and Aziraphale began shoveling, packing Crowley in. When he's done, he'll lace the bag up from end to end - no zippers or snaps here. Then he'll tie the entire bag with hefty rope and suspend it, let its cigar shape hang and sway gently over his head.
Three hours.
Three hours in the bag and the sand in total silence. After three hours, Aziraphale will come get him, dig him out with his own two hands as if discovering his gorgeous husband all over again.
But if Crowley needs him, all he has do is say his name and Aziraphale will be there.