Sunday, January 16th, 2039
Aziraphale had a million different versions of this conversation spinning around his mind when he knocked on Crowley's door, but when Crowley finally opens the door, he finds he cannot get a single word out.
"Aziraphale." Crowley's voice is pulled taut, on the edge of breaking. "Why are you here?"
Aziraphale hasn't seen him in six years. He looks just the same—of course he looks just the same. He doesn't age. It hasn't even been long enough for Crowley to have decided to change his hair again. He's still this vaguely man-shaped being, all straight lines and sharp angles and brownish-red hair styled very meticulously to look like he doesn't care. He's still dressed head to toe in black and wears those stupid sunglasses to cover up his yellow eyes.
"Oh, uh," Aziraphale says, panicking, "Your jacket is new."
Crowley glances down at his black leather jacket—Aziraphale gets a blink-and-you'll-miss-it glimpse of Crowley's bright eyes—and then back up at Aziraphale. "No, I got it in the seventies," he says, "you didn't see me in it."
"Ah," says Aziraphale.
"Come to think," Crowley continues, "I don't know if I wore it much at all. It was too in fashion. Made me look—" His mouth twists down in distaste. "—Ordinary. Average. You know, trendy."
"Uh-huh," says Aziraphale. He's not entirely following the conversation; he's still drinking Crowley in, and then drinking him in some more, and then drinking him in some more, the way Crowley chugs fine wine. Aziraphale's missed the gravelly drag of Crowley's words when Crowley pitches his voice low, and the nasally whine of them when he pitches his voice high. He's missed the way Crowley drapes himself around, lounging against any surface that it is possible to lounge on and some that are not. He finds it extremely heartening that even though he has said nothing of value, Crowley is still lounging against the doorframe, propping the door open with one hand, and making no move to close it. "You could never be ordinary."
Crowley's attempt at casual, which isn't fooling Aziraphale at all, wobbles. "I know, I'm a demon. I don't need reminding."
Aziraphale's heart drops. "That's not what I—" he begins, "I didn't mean—Oh, for Heaven's sake, Crowley, could you just let me in?"
Crowley stops breathing and stares. Aziraphale clasps his hands so tightly they hurt.
"I don't—well, I'd really rather—I think this is a conversation we should have inside," Aziraphale adds haltingly after several long seconds. "It's about—you know. Listen, I'm sorry, I am, there are mortals out here and I can't be talking about angels and demons—"
Crowley kicks the door open and unceremoniously turns his back on Aziraphale, sauntering into the flat. His saunter looks a little bit off-kilter.
Aziraphale stares after him, heart pounding in his throat. He thinks absently that perhaps he should stop his heart altogether if it is going to be this distracting.
"Are you coming?" Crowley asks impatiently.
Aziraphale lets out a quiet, "Oh," and hurries in.
The door slams shut behind him of its own accord.
Crowley turns. "Well?" he prompts.
Aziraphale feels very put on the spot. "Well…" Where to even begin? "I've had quite the day."
"Yes," Crowley says, "So have I." Without anything to lounge on, he's standing with his arms crossed, but it fails to convey attitude and looks much more like Crowley is trying to hug himself very tightly.
Aziraphale perseveres: "I went to Heaven—they had a party, you know, for the grand release of—well—of Soul-Mates."
Crowley waits a moment, but Aziraphale is still trying to figure out what to say. Crowley ventures, "Was it… fun?"
"Well, no, I missed it. I was calling you."
Crowley makes some sort of noise.
"Or, I was already late when you called, but I missed the end while I was calling you," Aziraphale amends. "Anyway, that's besides the point. The point is, I'm not an angel anymore. I thought—well, I sort of thought you might like to know."
Crowley makes a much louder noise, something akin to, "Huhhg? I don't—you're what now?"
"I'm not," Aziraphale corrects. "I'm not an angel anymore."
Crowley starts forward, towards Aziraphale. "Are you—did you—did they kick you out of Heaven because of, you know—?" He sounds so genuinely worried that Aziraphale finds it quite difficult to speak.
He manages a concise, "No."
Crowley halts a few steps away. "Then why?"
"I'm getting there," Aziraphale says, rather flustered. "I just, well. I quit. And, by the way, it is, apparently, rude to ask about someone's Soul-Mate and no one does it."
Crowley stares. "You quit," he echoes, rather flatly. "What? Why?"
"Well. I was—well I guess it was because I was up for a promotion."
"A promotion."
"And I found it sort of dishonorable to take it without saying anything about my Soul-Mate, so I told them that you're my Soul-Mate, and then there was—well, there was the whole, uh, situation, where they told me it must be false and I had better get it changed, and I told them it couldn't be false because I'm quite certain I'm in love with you—"
Crowley makes another one of his unintelligible sounds that amounts to, essentially, huh?
"—And they said well and angel can't love a demon, they're un-Forgivable, and so forth and so finally I said if an angel can't love a demon than I quit. You know, my job as an angel, that is. I quit being and angel. And so I thought you might like to know that I'm not an angel, not anymore."
Aziraphale pulls in a long breath, having given this rather monologue-like explanation in one breath. Crowley's stunned expression has not cleared away, despite this explanation, which though short, sums up all the relevant information neatly so that Crowley can understand the situation. Crowley seems to have trouble processing anyway, as if someone has sort of hit pause on him and frozen him in a single arms crossed, eyebrows raised, mouth slightly open frame and left him there on hold.
"Er—so I didn't really Fall. I certainly haven't felt anything. I just walked out," Aziraphale explains, in case Crowley hasn't gotten it yet.
Crowley goes, "Uh?"
The longer this frozen-Crowley thing goes on, the more foolish Aziraphale begins to feel—why did he think Crowley would want to hear this from him? Yes, it is possibly the biggest, most important event of Aziraphale's six-thousand year life—aside from meeting Crowley—but that doesn't mean it's important to Crowley. After all, Crowley cut him off six years ago and apparently did not have the urge to contact Aziraphale once during that time. And now he's just staring at Aziraphale, not moving or speaking, and Aziraphale is smoothing his lapels in Crowley's bare, sharp-angled apartment, wondering of Crowley's going to speak at all, or if maybe Aziraphale should do them both a favor and show himself out.
Crowley did say not to contact him.
"I just thought you might like to know," Aziraphale says again, uselessly. And then, really, he can't help himself any longer. "I just really miss you, Crowley."
Crowley reaches up to his face and pulls of his sunglasses slowly, almost gently, and folds them silently. He attempts to put them in his pocket and misses once before he gets it in. It looks like his hands are shaking, although Aziraphale is too far away to tell for sure. Then he curls his arms around himself again. "Do you?" he says in a quiet, scratchy voice.
For a moment, Aziraphale is at a loss. How to express to Crowley just how much he misses him evades him—language is not built for emotions as big as the ones that live inside Aziraphale, especially not in regards to Crowley—but it also stuns him speechless for a moment that Crowley even has to ask. What does Crowley think Aziraphale has been feeling these past six years? Did he think Aziraphale just went on with his merry life, selling books, partying in Heaven, meeting new demons to fall in love with?
He swallows hard, suddenly extremely aware of the absurdity, the awkwardness of his human body: where does he put his hands when all they want to do is reach for Crowley, how is he supposed to stand when he's a fumbling fifteen feet away from Crowley and it feels like they're on opposite sides of an ocean, how is he supposed to use his voice and the English language to express something as immeasurable, as inexpressible as how much he has missed Crowley?
I want to hear you yell at your houseplants, he wants to say, and I wish you would make fun of my magic act again, and I want to ride too fast in your Bentley and listen to every single track I put into the CD player to somehow turn into a Queen song. Aziraphale wants to take Crowley by the shoulders and stare into his yellow snake eyes, and tell him, I never asked you what you might like to do instead of going out to eat, because you don't eat, and I realize now you were just indulging me and I imagine asking you every day and I imagine your answers and I don't want to have to keep imagining what you might say, I want to know.
"Crowley," he says finally, because none of these things are enough, "Life isn't life without you. I just exist."
Crowley starts forward, as if pushed from behind, but he stops just short of Aziraphale, his eyes wide and entirely yellow, his hands up like he was about to touch Aziraphale before thought better of it. They fall to his sides, but he doesn't step back. "I missed you too," he says. The way he says it, he makes it sound like a thousand words in just three. He makes it sound like three other words that Aziraphale hasn't stopped thinking about for six years straight.
"Crowley." Aziraphale closes his eyes; he's so close he can see the little indents on Crowley's face where his glasses press against his skin, and he feels as if he is about to overflow. "I hate being apart. I'm sorry about everything, you know. I didn't think—I don't know what I was thinking. But I wanted to be a good angel, and it wasn't worth it. It wasn't worth you. I'm done with it—with trying to be Good instead of trying to be good—and, I thought—" His voice is getting higher and higher. "I love you. I'm in love with you. And I thought—Crowley—"
Cool fingertips against his jaw steal his breath from his lungs abruptly, and his eyes fly open. Crowley's face is even closer now, his hands are cupping Aziraphale's face, and he looks unbearably beautiful.
"Angel," he murmurs gently, and it feels like the world has just been reborn. "Please stop talking."
Aziraphale opens his mouth to ask why, but he gets his answer before he gets the words out of his mouth: Crowley is kissing him. Crowley has both hands cupping his face now, and his lips are slightly cool—probably because he's cold-blooded—but his mouth is surprisingly warm and his teeth aren't pointy at all. Aziraphale takes five seconds to enjoy the slow, tender way he's being kissed: the way Crowley's shirt brushes his own, the way he turns his head and moves his mouth slow and careful. Then he abandons all pretense of having patience.
He twists his fingers into the sides of Crowley's leather jacket and he kisses Crowley messy and head-on and thorough, so hard Crowley stumbles back against the wall and makes a gasping noise into Aziraphale's mouth, his hands falling from Aziraphale's face onto his shoulders for balance. He presses against Crowley, a knee between Crowley's legs, his heart like a hummingbird in his chest.
"Sorry," he says, pulling away and opening his eyes. Crowley looks stunned six ways to Sunday, his breath coming short, his cheeks flushed red, and his eyes wide open. "Should I stop?"
"Angel." It sounds like a whine. "Who goes too fast again?"
Aziraphale finds himself laughing breathlessly. "Am I going too fast?"
"No," Crowley pronounces emphatically. "Keep going."
"Then it's still you," Aziraphale says, and hitches his knee a little higher. "And I'm not an angel anymore."
Crowley's eyes focus. They find Aziraphale's and hold them. "You are to me," he says quietly. "I never did care what Heaven had to say."