I'd rather be in outer space 🛸
@theartofmadeline
occasionally subtle
祝日 / Permanent Vacation
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
Misplaced Lens Cap
Andulka
🪼
Sweet Seals For You, Always
DEAR READER
taylor price
izzy's playlists!
Today's Document
Claire Keane
Jules of Nature
oozey mess
RMH
tumblr dot com
let's talk about Bridgerton tea, my ask is open
Game of Thrones Daily
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Chile
seen from Australia
seen from France
seen from Malaysia
seen from Argentina
seen from Philippines
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Canada
seen from France
seen from United States
seen from Mexico
seen from United States
seen from United States
@elementarymyqueerestwatson
YOU'RE IN HER DMS AND IM IN A LONE OLIVE TREE ON THE SNOWY MOUNTIAN PATH WHERE THE GRAVEYARD USED TO BE MY SKIN OVERCOME WITH BARK MY LIMBS TWISTING INTO BRANCHES IT IS SO COLD I CAN FEEL MY EYES TURNING TO OLIVE PITS BUT ALWAYS MY MIND STAYS I AM HERE AND THOUGH I CAN FEEL THE SAP IN MY THROAT FREEZING IN THE WINTER AIR I KNOW THAT I WILL REMAIN WE ARE NOT THE SAME
What do you want for Christmas?
Attention
INFLICT YOURSELF UPON THE WORLD UNTIL IT LOVES YOU BACK
Did You Know?
Birds control time! They do this out of spite.
In case anyone needed it, heres a translation:
Guy filming: “give me chile, dude. Let me get chile, dude! LET ME GET CHILE. AAH. NO! NO!”
Lady at the table (I cant really hear her but I think she says?): give him a tostada
Guy filming: *pointing knife at bird* give me chile, fucker. *bird moves* I thought so, bitch.
Unfinished Business
(An unfinished ficlet about 6,000 year old idiots learning how to kiss.)
Crowley drained his glass. “Have you?” he asked, punctuating his query with a blithe, “Ever?”
“Ever what?”
Aziraphale knew exactly what. And Crowley knew he knew exactly what, going by the way his eyebrows were slowly inching up his forehead like twin, fuzzy caterpillars whose souls had shuffled off this mortal coil and were beginning their ascent into the afterlife.
Aziraphale snapped his book shut as fussily as possible, which was pretty damn fussy. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.
“You do,” Crowley rebutted.
Shit.
Aziraphale spun on his heel. He busied himself with tucking Moby Dick back where it belonged on his desk with the other Melvilles. He could feel Crowley’s gaze bore into his thoracic vertebrae while he stalled, trying and failing to soothe the heart pounding in his chest for no good reason. He flattened his palms against his lapel; a little pat-pat to make sure they were lying neatly.
“No,” Aziraphale finally admitted. Followed by a defensive, “Have you?”
“Nope.”
Oh.
Well, that was a surprise.
Azirapahle glanced at Crowley over his shoulder, assessing. Both of Crowley’s arms were akimbo on the back of the sofa, legs sprawled artfully and–dare Aziraphale think it–invitingly. His ankles crossed and the gleam of his snakeskin boots lambent in the dim light of Azirapahle’s shop.
“I thought that sort of thing was…” Aziraphale twiddled his fingers in an approximation of something or nothing at all. “…a part of your lot’s milieu.”
“I don’t have a lot. Neither do you.”
“You know what I mean.”
Crowley smirked. “I rather thought kissssing was more of a heavenly affair.” He tilted his head to one side. “Love…” he drawled with a curl of his lip, like the very word was in itself divine, and perhaps it was. “…’n all.”
“Ah.” He had a point. But…
“You don’t have to kiss someone to have sex with them, angel.”
Aziraphale could feel himself turning red. The avatar of his body was betraying him altogether. “I-I know that!” (He hadn’t.) “Sex isn’t always governed by lust, you know.”
“Mmm, was never really my thing.”
Aziraphale blinked.
“Lust,” Crowley specified.
Aziraphale blinked again.
“Icky.” Crowley smacked his lips, frowning. “Humans. They leave gobs of themselves everywhere. All those fluids and hair and skin!”
“You’re a snake,” Aziraphale reminded him, exasperated.
“Well, yeah. But that’s…” Crowley shrugged. “…snakey, innit?”
Aziraphale rolled his eyes.
Crowley sprang to his feet. He jabbed a finger at Aziraphale, a devilish lilt to his voice when he crooned, “You’re curious.”
“I am not!” Aziraphale lied. Badly. He scampered away, collecting a stack of books from one organized mess and sorted them into another organized mess on the other side of the room.
Crowley trailed along behind him with his hands stuffed in his pockets. Or as stuffed as they could be in his tight, leather trousers. He followed Aziraphale from one shelf to the next, twisting and turning around a pillar here, a marble bust there, more and more amused by Aziraphale’s bluster and fluster. “You are!” he sing-songed. “I saw you making goo-goo eyes at the lovebirds in the park.”
Aziraphale blanched. He tripped over a step ladder he never really used anyway. Stupid. Why did he even own such a thing? It wasn’t like he needed it. “I was making eyes, as you so eloquently put it, at the love they were emanating, not–” He tripped again. This time into an entire bookcase, which was something he needed. So focused was he on preventing the impending avalanche, Crowley effectively trapped him against the shelves by the cunning use of what Aziraphale knew to be called leaning.
“Oh, dear,” he murmured.
Crowley watched him avert his eyes to the ceiling, the floor, and back again. He waited until Aziraphale deigned to look at him. Approximately one minute and ten seconds, which wasn’t that long in the great scheme of things, but a rather ridiculous amount of time not to look at the person standing in front of you. “Do you trust me?” Crowley asked when their eyes finally met.
Aziraphale was offended. Did he trust Crowley? Of course he trusted him! A thousand times–six thousand times–yes! Aziraphale meant to say as much, but ended up squawking instead. And that was rather embarrassing. So he nodded. But he wasn’t happy about it.
“Say it.” A flash of teeth. Equal parts commanding and pleading, which must have inadvertently spirited all the oxygen out of the room because it was suddenly difficult to breathe. And necessary, besides.
Aziraphale swallowed thickly. “Yes.”
Crowley edged closer. Invading his personal space. Not that he’d never done that before. Personal space was all very relative to beings who can will themselves as small as a microbe at any given moment. But still. Right then and there, the air between them hot and humid, it was quite invasive.
One beat.
Two.
Neither of them moved.
“Alright?” Aziraphale asked, tentative.
“Yeah–no–” Crowley stammered. He cleared his throat. “I’m fine. Fine. Are you…um…?”
“Fine?”
“Fine, yes.”
“Yes.”
This was absurd.
“You started it,” Aziraphale mumbled.
“I–no–nyrk–look! You wanna do this or not?”
Aziraphale pursed his lips. “I suppose. If it’s you.”
“Right. Okay, then.” Crowley bullied himself flush against Aziraphale’s chest.
They were nose to nose. Still familiar territory. They regarded each other, a little cross-eyed, and Crowley pivoted ever so slightly to his left so their noses not only touched at their tips, but slotted side by side. Which was very much new. And nice. Soft and warm and they could feel each other’s pulses hammering away uselessly, but somehow unavoidably.
Aziraphale shut his eyes. He wanted to see, but Crowley’s features had gone all blurry. He wasn’t sure he could will his vision to adjust because are those Crowley’s hands on his waist? He licked his lips, nervous, and made the most outrageous yelp when the tip of his tongue met flesh and sweet Jesus and his barefoot apostles.
Aziraphale had sampled the most exorbitant wine, the most delectable foods the Earth has to offer. No fruit, fermented or otherwise, compared to the brief taste of Crowley’s lip. Whichever one it had been. Sweet and firm and delicious.
“Sorry,” Azirapahle gasped. It had been an accident even though he liked it.
“No, it’s…” Crowley’s hands kneaded fretfully against his waistcoat. “…do it again.”
“Okay.” Aziraphale stuck out his tongue. A bit shy. A bit overwhelmed. A bit what-the-Hell. And so he probed, just there, and licked with unrestrained indulgence.
Crowley’s spine went ramrod straight. “Aziraphale,” he spoke the angel’s name like a benediction. And then, “Aziraphale!” Scandalized. Delighted.
Aziraphale squinted open one of his eyes. Then the other. “Did I do it right?”
Crowley had the most annoying and sinfully crooked smile on his face. “You made an Effort!”
“Oh.” Aziraphale sighed irritably. “I had to!”
Crowley was looking at him the exact same way he did when Aziraphale told him he’d given his flaming sword away six thousand years ago.
“The fit of my trousers just wouldn’t do without the Effort, dear.”
Crowley blatantly stared at Aziraphale’s crotch. “Is it functional?”
“Not sure, really.”
Crowley gawked at him.
“It’s simply for aesthetics, mind you. Would you rather I didn’t…?”
“What? I–no–of course! It’s–it’s fine, yes.”
“Do you have…?”
“Sometimes.”
“Is yours functional?”
“Sometimes.”
Aziraphale was pretty sure he was Falling because his veins felt like they were on fire.
“Would you rather I didn’t?”
“It’s fine.”
“Good. Shall we?” Crowley swooped in close without waiting for a response. Their noses knocked and their mouths pressed firmly together over their teeth, but Aziraphale’s tongue was back where it belonged and Crowley positively melted into the sensation. Sighing, sinking firmly into the spit-plush of Aziraphale’s mouth (before remembering himself), and standing back up to his full height. And, oh. That was rather delicious, that friction, their clothes rucking up and up and yes. Crowley managed to restrain himself, allowing space between their lips once again, and he reveled in the sensation of Aziraphale tonguing right where he used to have a soul patch in the 1590s. Nothing until this moment had made him want to revisit that particular facial hair trend.
“Hath ith?” Azirapahle asked.
“What?”
Regrettably, Aziraphale’s tongue retreated back into his mouth. “How’s this?”
“Great,” Crowley all but sobbed. “Keep going.”
Aziraphale didn’t have to be told twice. Not when it mattered. And his natural curiosity got the better of him. After probing the same spot with his tongue five or six or twenty times (He lost count.), he pursed his lips for just a little sip. He privately thought that Crowley never truly learned how to use his human legs, his hips the fulcrum of his languid and snaking gait. But, standing? Crowley had that down to a science. Contrapposto, mostly, a holdover from the Renaissance, his body striking an S-curve that would put The David to shame. It was an art form, really, so it came as a shock when Crowley’s knees betrayed him altogether.
Aziraphale caught him around the middle. “Are you alright?”
The question was barely posed before Crowley regained his footing and pinned him up against the bookcase hard enough to send a few volumes toppling to the floor, saved in the nick of time by a quick snap of Crowley’s fingers.
“Do that again,” he demanded, almost frantic.
If Azirapahle thought there had been no space between them before, he was sadly mistaken. Crowley nuzzled their mouths together, curtailing a desperate whine with an explosive sigh the moment Aziraphale sandwiched Crowley’s philtrum between his lips and suckled just so.
“Oooh.” Crowley almost sounded in pain. “Fuck me.”
Aziraphale pulled off Crowley’s lip with a wet pop that seriously did things to Crowley in places he didn’t even know he had. “W–really?”
“No! I mean, yes! But no. Later. Kissing now.” Crowley bit down on Aziraphale’s bottom lip and tugged. Not quite sipping, but just as good. If not better. And there was Crowley’s forked tongue drawing him in and further in. His teeth sharp in the best possible way, followed by a massive slurp that had Aziraphale’s eyes rolling back in his head before Crowley released him.
Aziraphale boggled, wide-eyed and panting. He was surely going to discorporate. “Oh, my God!”
“Don’t bring Her into this.”
Both of them glanced overhead.
No, best not to call upon the Almighty in flagrante.
“So that’s what all the fuss is about.”
“I’d say so, yeah.”
Aziraphale was on him in a flash, drinking greedily at his lips, one after the other, and Crowley absolutely refused to wait his turn nicely. Because he wasn’t. Nice, that is. Not even a little bit. That was the good thing about being a snake, he thought, unhinging his jaw just enough to devour Azirapahle’s mouth and they both moaned in unison at the feel of hot, wet heat and breath and slick and fuckfuckfuck!
A sudden gust of wind, a loud FWHUMP. The sound of a lamp smashing to the floor, maybe.
Crowley’s wings were fanned out behind him. He was gasping for breath like it was something he needed to live, fingers wound tight in Aziraphale’s coat. “Fuck,” he said.
“We need to slow down.”
Crowley snarled, “Any slower and I swear I’m going to literally explode.”
Oh fuck me he has tears in his eyes already.
okay no if we’re gonna do this we’re gonna do it PROPER.
Because look at me. Listen.
First of all, I want everyone to remember that Aziraphale says these things before Crowley ever mentions running off.
But to really understand that, we have to go back in time. We have to go back to 1861 at St James and watch when Aziraphale says to Crowley, in a kind of snobby way, “We may have both started off as angels, but you are Fallen.” At this point in their story, Aziraphale doesn’t know that Crowley loves him, or if he does, he doesn’t believe it is real, and he certainly doesn’t understand his own feelings for it. As a matter of fact, he makes this accusation just a minute before Crowley turns his world upside down by asking for holy water, and Aziraphale is very, very suddenly and without warning thrown into a world where he has to consider his world without Crowley in it.
And he melts down. He’s always been worried, at the back of his mind, that one or both of their sides would find out about their arrangement. He’s always, to some degree, had the idea that if Crowley were caught he would be punished, maybe discorporated, maybe even destroyed, but… you know, Crowley’s just been around for so long, and he’s so vibrantly full of life, he’s so cocksure and flippant and he very obviously has this will to live and be alive that Aziraphale never really believes in the possibility that Crowley will stop being there. What Aziraphale believes, is that Crowley’s desire to remain alive will ensure that he does.
But the holy water request is the first time Aziraphale has come face to face with the idea that Crowley… might give up. I don’t mean to say that he thinks Crowley wants to die, I don’t think that’s… really the point. The point is that Aziraphale sees that there may come a time when, rather than fight to stay alive and come back to Aziraphale, Crowley would be willing to surrender and be destroyed. That idea will be very important soon.
Skip forward, and we see and end to their fight in the Blitz, when Crowley saves Azriaphale from the Nazis. Aziraphale has had time to consider what transpired in 1861. When Crowley arrives to save him and requests to be saved in return, it sounds like business as usual, except… Crowley does something selfless, in saving the books. He does something kind. Now, I’m sure, absolutely CERTAIN, that Crowley has done kind things before, but it’s Aziraphale that’s changed now. It’s Aziraphale who looks at his action and (aside from realizing oh. I love him. oh that’s why it’s like this) has the first thought that… maybe he’s been wrong to assume Crowley can’t be anything other than what he is. For perhaps the first time, the thought that “maybe he could be redeemed” forms. Aziraphale may not understand it as such but the seed has been planted.
Fast forward again, and all the stuff with the apocalypse is happening. Crowley comes to him and asks him to help stop it. Crowley spends the majority of the series begging Aziraphale, in various ways, to work toward saving all of humanity and the Earth. Crowley is the one advocating, at every turn, for them to please do something to stop this. Not hell. not heaven. not god. Crowley. And this comes on the heels of everything else Aziraphale is feeling about how much he will lose, and what right and wrong really mean, and he’s been lying to Crowley and lying to Heaven and he’s stolen a book and the world’s already turned upside down as far as he’s concerned.
And Crowley turns up to the bandstand, and asks what Aziraphale knows and Aziraphale can’t tell him because he needs to have a plan first, and Crowley tells him he hasn’t got anything, and Aziraphale tries to tell him it’s someone’s plan at least, and Crowley loses it. He starts cussing out the plan and - by proxy - god. He’s showing the same open disregard for his well being as he did in 1861. He’s got nothing either, and without something, there’s no hope. There’s only surrender to the inevitable.
But it’s been nearly 60 years since Aziraphale realized he can’t lose Crowley. Not since he realized he loved him, but since he realized he cannot lose him. And the apocalypse is heading in at full tilt, and when it arrives, it’s going to take Crowley away from him, and Aziraphale has seen Crowley do good. He’s seen him be kind. He’s seen him act in very undemonlike ways. And he has that one, crystal-clear moment of hope.
May you be forgiven.
Not just for cussing out god’s plan, not just for spitting in the face of divinity in that moment, but forgiven at all.
And Crowley hears that in the words. When Aziraphale says “may you be forgiven,” Crowley hears “for everything” because his response doesn’t fit right if he thinks Aziraphale just means for this.
“I won’t be forgiven, not ever. Part of a demon’s job description: Unforgivable. That’s what I am.”
AND THAT ENTIRE BIT IS SO IMPORTANT.
“I won’t be forgiven, not ever” doesn’t refer to just this moment, it reaches all the way back to the Fall. Importantly, he doesn’t say “I’m unforgivable” at any point, he follows a logic track:
“Part of a demon’s job description” isn’t “part of what I am intrinsically.”
“That’s what I am” isn’t “I’m unforgivable” it’s “I’m a demon”
And it’s a demon’s job to be unforgivable.
“I won’t be forgiven because it’s my job not to be forgiven”
And Aziraphale’s response to that?? “You were an angel once.” A clear reminder that being a demon was not always Crowley’s job. A bid to ask Crowley to consider quitting his job and coming back, just like I said in the first place. Aziraphale has seen Crowley be good and kind. Some part of him believes that Crowley could be forgiven and come back, if he would just put his mind to it. This is a direct mirror of the 1861 conversation, and it shows the HUGE amount of growth that Aziraphale has gone through, to change from “you were an angel once but you’re a demon now and that’s immutable” to “You’re acting badly right now but you were an angel once, don’t you think there’s a chance you could be forgiven still?”
(he never considers that Crowley might not want to come back, that Crowley believes what was done to him was unfair and that he doesn’t need forgiveness because he didn’t do anything that needs it, but that’s another meta entirely)
Before Crowley ever utters “go off together,” Aziraphale is already ready to ask him to come back to the light, to come home, to please not go away, to please not leave him here alone. Because he can’t lose Crowley. They may bicker and snipe at each other for a moment, trying to argue about the plan, and Crowley is still fighting to save everything even if his methods are untenable, but he is fighting still, and Aziraphale is still holding onto hope-
Right up until Crowley lays everything at his feet and asks him to choose.
“Even if this all ends up in a puddle of burning goo, we can go off together.”
He tells Aziraphale basically ‘you don’t have to lose me, but you can’t have both, and I won’t come back to your side.’
That’s the ultimatum that breaks them. Crowley will leave his side - and in a way he left his side millennia ago - but he won’t join Aziraphale’s side. That’s the choice Aziraphale is asking him to make. Aziraphale will fight to get Crowley back into Heaven, but he isn’t mentally or emotionally in a place where he can leave his side. That’s the choice Crowley’s asking him to make.
They both are asking the other to come away with them in their own way, and they can’t meet in the middle yet. They will, but not yet. It’s important to me, however, that they both - both - make the request here, that they both come to the conclusion “I don’t want to go on unless we’re together” on their own and then going about it in truly different and equally terrible ways. And both of them having a bit of a fit when it doesn’t work.
“Crowley will leave his side - and in a way he left his side millennia ago - but he won’t join Aziraphale’s side”
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head with this. I think that’s the fundamental miscommunication and gap between them.
Crowley is technically a demon, but he’s not on Hell’s side - he’s never been on Hell’s side, he’s only ever been on his own side, doing his best to have the best life in a shitty situation, and along the way that side has grown to incorporate Aziraphale.
We see Crowley is incredibly bitter about being kicked out of Heaven, but I think that’s bitter in the sense of ‘I was punished unfairly’ as opposed to ‘I want to go back there.’
Aziraphale, on the other hand, is purely on Heaven’s side, (in his words and mind at least, if not always his actions), and for someone who is so adamently on a side, it’s inconceivable that Crowley would not be on a side. And to link to that, he sees that Crowley hates Hell and hates being a demon, so to Aziraphale, the most obvious choice is: ‘well just come back to us then. you’re not like other demons, you’ll be forgiven,’ because in his mind, the world is divided into two sides: you’re either on Heaven’s side or you’re on Hell’s side. There is no other side. The thought that Crowley might not want to be on either side is just inconceivable to him.
Not only that, but from a personal perspective, 99.9% of the time, Crowley has always come to Aziraphale, very rarely the other way round. We see that in the cold open: 90% of the time, Crowley initiated conversation, or Crowley came up to Aziraphale. Apart from giving him the holy water, Aziraphale, on some level knows, if he waits long enough, Crowley will come to him.
So in his mind and with this history, he thinks this can’t be any different. Yes, Crowley appears to not like Heaven, and appears to be getting annoyed with him, but he knows Crowley will come round and join his side because he always does.
It is therefore a huge shock to his system and their Arrangement, when Crowley, perhaps for the first time ever, basically says ‘no. I will never come to your side. Not ever.’ And we see that with how Crowley shuts the conversation right down. Like you say, he doesn’t make it personal and about him being unforgiveable, he makes it factual and logcial ‘Unforgiveable, that’s what I am. Part of the demon’s job description.’
And this is huge, because Crowley, unlike Aziraphale, never evokes partisanship, he never uses the fact he’s a demon to not do something.If he doesn’t want to do something, he just won’t do it. Or say he doesn’t want to. Except now. Because he’s using it as a barrier. He’s not saying ‘I am not joining Heaven because I don’t want to,’ because I don’t think he’s ready to open that can of worms to Aziraphale who clearly loves Heaven, he’s putting it down to what he is. Using it as a barrier. A fact. And Aziraphale can’t argue with the facts.
And Aziraphale is floored. Because it looks like Crowley is choosing Helll over him. Evoking his partisanship. And Crowley’s never done that before, and maybe he’s misread him and when it all comes down to it, Crowley really would choose Hell over him.
And that hurts Aziraphale, because he realises in that moment, that that is exactly what he would do. He would choose Heaven over Crowley, because he thinks that’s what he should do. And that jars. That really jars. Because it doesn’t feel right. But if he doesn’t pick Heaven, he has to pick Hell and that just feels worse. And I think this is the first time he starts to really feel that cognitive dissonance which then follows him throughout the rest of the show.
Stop breaking your own heart by exaggerating your place in other people's lives
here’s the animatic i’ve been working on for a month! please give it a watch!
Absolutely fantastic! The expressions, the whole story, the, the, the EVERYTHING!!!
Watch it. Watch it now, and like it and REBLOG it! The whole world needs to see this! Chef kiss MWAH!
Lovely animation!
obsessed with this h2o tiktok i found
wolves:
all the other wolves in the pack:
guess I’ll always be a sensitive bitch, nothing can help it
Imagine all those abandoned johnlock blogs logging back in when s5 airs and they open their dash and whoops all good omens
So I think I might be bi? But if I am it changes almost nothing about my life because I am happily and monogamously married. But if it doesn't really matter, why do I have so many feelings about it???? Anyways, I am asking you because it seems like there is a 50/50 chance of a delightful and pithy answer or a picture of a bird as an answer.
ALTERNATE CONCLUSION
