Walking in the Air
This is going up literally as I’ve finished writing it. It’s not beta’ed or anything.
For @tlou15 who replied to my request for prompts with: “I would like to see Aziraphale and Crowley going to the country side to have night flying dates”. Took me an embarrassing second to realise it wasn’t anything to do with fruits.
And yes, it’s titled after the song. Do listen to it while reading this, if you like.
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The car that had pulled up on the other side of the road from the bookshop was quite the familiar sight in the area and so was its owner. So was the owner’s reaction if you touched or even made mention of anything the car did and consequently, no one made a peep of comment about the fact that the car was idling and had been for at least half an hour.
Of course, it should’ve been fine, seeing as the engine had never seen a drop of petrol since it had been bought – the petrol bought in the sixties by its owner had been given to some youth who was protesting something or other, it was hard to keep track of them all at the time.
Somehow, though, despite the fact that it drove purely because its owner expected it to rather than having any combustion happening in its engine, it also put out quite the cloud of exhaust, whether it was idling or not, because its owner expected it to.
Right now, it put out even more than it usually did, and one might wonder if it was in response to said owner and his mood.
The owner who sat inside, in the driver’s seat, a bundle of energy that could only be called nervous.
Why would he be nervous, it might be asked and rightly so, perhaps. After all, he’d walked the earth for actual millennia, seen just about every permutation of evil, and good, that humanity could muster, and been instrumental in causing a few of them, on both sides. He’d been friends with his hereditary enemy for roughly as long and he’d gone up against Heaven and Hell themselves with said enemy in a bid to avert Armageddon.
Which they’d accomplished, too, somehow, though he had a pretty clear idea that without the presence of such a clever, sensible and entirely human Antichrist, all due to a previous cock-up, they would’ve been, well, buggered, screwed, fucked. Take your pick, or they might’ve gone for them all.
The point was that considering all of that, it was very strange that he was nervous about this. Not that he’d been precisely calm through the averted apocalypse, especially not when this very same car had burst into flame and he’d had to struggle to keep it together, both metaphorically and quite literally. But the point remained even so.
When you looked at him, there could be no other words for it, at least if you knew what to look for, knowing better than to confuse the small, suppressed gestures for impatience or annoyance, and especially if you knew the reason he was letting his car idle outside a particular Soho bookshop.
He was going on a date. They were going on a date, Aziraphale and him. Together. The two of them.
Just the two of them. On a date.
They’d been to dinner before, of course. Lunches, too, even a few breakfasts. Gone to the theatre, been to more than a few concerts as well as a few operas.
So what if Crowley happened to like operas?
The point was that they’d done quite a lot of things that could be considered dates already and he’d got through them easily enough.
Relatively easily, at least, but, well…
So, why was he so nervous about this one? It wasn’t even the first time after they’d averted the end of the world and things had changed. All in all, things should just be as they always were.
There was no denying he was nervous, though. Of course, that didn’t mean he was going to admit it out loud or even acknowledge it to himself.
If he did, the culprit might be that he had called it a date, when he’d asked Aziraphale a week or two ago. Not left it open to interpretation as such or alluded more or less obliquely to it that way.
No, he’d come right out and asked, one day after much consideration, at least that was what he called it, and had caused Aziraphale to pause in his work.
“Date?” he’d asked as he’d started up working again, and though he was hardly the one to keep current, to say the least, he had understood it had nothing to do with the fruit mostly eaten around Christmas, for whatever reason, and everything to do with two people going out.
“Yeah. Date. You and me,” Crowley had clarified, just be sure, casual as anything. He’d even leant against a bookshelf as he’d said it. “I was thinking a drive out into the countryside, just take in the scenic route. Maybe have a picnic.”
He’d dropped the reference in there, wondering whether Aziraphale would pick up on it or not. Expecting that he wouldn’t, hoping that he would.
Judging from the way that the angel had almost dropped a book he’d been putting back on the shelf, it seemed likely that he had.
A, a picnic,” he’d echoed. He’d stared into the shelf for a moment that was very long, or felt it, and Crowley had wondered whether he’d outright decline or just ignore that something had been said at all.
Then he’d turned around, a smile on his face that was bright and delighted, with just a hint, the demon had thought, of nervousness in there.
“A picnic sounds utterly delightful, my dear, I would love to,” he’d said and that had been that.
Well, no, not quite that. There’d been the practicalities of when and where and such, of course, as well as convincing Aziraphale that he wouldn’t be in charge of catering.
The angel seemed to have taken that to mean they were buying a hamper from a place somewhere, possibly local, to take out into a field or something similar.
They…weren’t.
Crowley glanced at the hamper stashed underneath the backseat, tucked away so that hopefully, Aziraphale wouldn’t spot it when he entered the car. He’d spent the last week sourcing everything good he could think of to take.
Then he’d spent some time sifting through those to actually make it fit into a hamper. Of course, there were miracles to sort such things out – bigger on the inside, hah, what would you need with bigger when you could have infinite? – and it wasn’t as though he didn’t want to spoil the angel…
But that was just it, wasn’t it? To spoil him properly, and to show that this was a date rather than merely one of their usual meetings, he needed something else. Something more. Something picked among the best of the best.
Something to show the angel just how much he meant to Crowley.
Not that he hadn’t shown him before, of course, in his own way. But now that he wasn’t merely not prevented from doing it but actively allowed to, as much as he liked, almost, he wasn’t going to pass up any opportunity he was given.
Of course, there was something else about this meeting in particular, apart from it being their officially labelled ‘date’, but, well…that was –
His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the passenger door opening. For a moment, he stiffened, worried about the hamper being discovered. Then his brain kicked in to inform him that what he’d heard was the front passenger door, not the back.
“Hello, dear,” an oh, so familiar and achingly beloved chimed as the car dipped with the weight when he got in.
“Aziraphale,” he acknowledged, his expression not changing an iota.
Then he glanced down, thinking he saw something, and sure enough, there was a small…not exactly hamper but certainly a basket in the other’s lap.
“Thought I said you weren’t in charge of the food,” he said, turning his attention back to face ahead. The car began to move, without him ever doing something as silly as pushing the pedals. He’d never thought he’d need them and therefore, he didn’t.
Oh, this isn’t – this is just a little something extra that I found,” Aziraphale said, somewhat…well, not exactly shiftily but slightly evasively, at least. “Thought it would be perfect for a picnic. I will say, though, that I’ve never had a dinner picnic rather than a lunch one before.”
Something new, then,” Crowley said as he turned out into traffic, metaphorically almost flooring the accelerator.
Aziraphale let out a gasp at that, sharp and high, and shot out a hand to try and grab onto something, anything for a steadying grip. He found it and his knuckles turned just a little whiter.
“Crowley!” he protested, loudly.
“What?” the demon asked, feigning innocence as he took a corner fast enough that he would’ve done a handbrake turn without a handbrake if he hadn’t been in control of the car.
“You don’t have to go this fast!”
“Aw, come on, angel, it’s no fun if you’re only going at the speed limit.” He accelerated just a tad more, to underline the point.
Speeding is one thing, endangering the pedestrians is – Crowley!”
“What?”
“You hit that cyclist!”
“I didn’t. I missed him by three quarters of an inch. That he went tumbling anyway, that’s not my fault, is it?”
It – “Aziraphale looked over to him, then stopped speaking and sighed, heavily. “Oh, it doesn’t matter what I say, does it? Or you might make it worse, just to spite me.”
“Never to spite you. Just…wind you up a little, maybe.”
“Really,” Aziraphale said, and the word really felt orphaned without the disapproving cluck afterwards that should’ve been there. Probably was in the expression, though, if Crowley turned to look.
He didn’t.
They made it out of inner London without any issue and really, in rather record time, to boot. So what if Crowley scared the life out of four cops, a criminal in the process of being arrested, a banker and two telephone salespersons on their way to work.
“You haven’t told me where we’re going,” Aziraphale commented after they’d made it out of the city altogether. He was looking out the window as he spoke, as though trying to guess just by what they passed.
Crowley hadn’t and there was a good reason for that. Well, perhaps not a good one, but a reason, anyway.
“You’ll see,” was all he said out loud about it.
He’d thought that as they left London, his nerves would calm at least a bit and he’d relax back into their normal chat and to be fair, it had. But the moment that the blond had asked, it had spiked right up again.
Was it too much? Too little? It would be too little, wouldn’t it? Or just plain stupid. Definitely plain stupid and Aziraphale would think so. He might even outright refuse to do it.
Not the picnic. The day Aziraphale outright refused food like that…that day Crowley would be sure the world had indeed ended – or someone else was trying to impersonate Aziraphale, and doing a really bad job it, too.
A hand landed gently on his knee. Just on his knee, well within the area that could be considered perfectly acceptable, even respectable.
They still didn’t touch a great deal, at least not by Crowley’s standards – or perhaps those were just fervent wishes – and when they did, it was not uncommon for it to stay at that perfectly respectable stage.
But the important point was that they did touch now, freely if not frequently, and there was a sense that said touching was allowed.
They could if they wanted to and do it as much as they wanted to, as well. The question might then be – why didn’t they?
To be fair to them, it hadn’t been that long since That Saturday, relatively speaking. Half a year, a bit more. Just about the time where the south of England was getting to be fairly warm again, by the standards of old Blighty, anyway, and might reasonably be expected to have a relatively lovely, if not exactly warm, night out like this.
To have gone from not touching at all, even actively avoiding it so as to be sure not to go anywhere they shouldn’t, over six millennia to this rather comfortable touching, infrequent or not, within a span of a little over six months was…quite an achievement, Crowley would say.
Not that he wouldn’t be thrilled with me, and practically melted whenever they ended up in a cuddle session, often because Crowley was an octopus rather than a snake when he was in a bed, sleeping or not, and Aziraphale was sitting, or sometimes even lying, beside him.
That wasn’t to say the angel was an unwilling or passive participant in the sessions, far from it. He just did it in his own way.
Such as touching his hand to a knee.
It helped that he left it there, too. Obviously.
“My dear, it is getting rather late for…well, if we’re to call in somewhere and buy something to eat, they’d be…well, it would be rather rude to expect them to keep their kitchens open for us.”
“As if you haven’t done that several times over the years, angel, and that’s putting it kindly,” Crowley countered, looking over at the other.
Glancing at him out of the corner of his eye didn’t work with the blinkers, for lack of a better term, that he had on his current set of sunglasses, as the most he saw there were disjointed colours through a metal mesh. If he turned his head a little, it seemed to give him the same effect, though, as well as being able to see the other.
“Well, I...” Aziraphale said, not quite spluttering but achieving something to that effect. “I may have, once or twice over the years, but I…that is…well, you’re allowed to mend a bad habit, aren’t you?”
“‘Course. Just find it interesting that the time you decide to mend it is the time when it’s not you who’s in charge of the food, for once.”
Again, he wasn’t looking fully at the other’s face as he spoke, but he still managed to clock the way Aziraphale’s face fell. Not completely but quite a bit, showing that he understood what Crowley was saying and what he was implying as well.
“I didn’t – oh, good grief, I’ve put my foot in it, haven’t I?”
“Just a bit.”
“That wasn’t what I meant, dear, and I apologise.”
He didn’t say anything more but then, what really was there to add? Further words wouldn’t change anything or make it more sincere. The sincerity was more than evident in the angel’s almost always very expressive voice.
Nor was Crowley about to say that it was okay because it wasn’t. It was only a minor thing, that was true, but it still mattered. That said, he wasn’t going to ignore it, either.
“Accepted,” he said instead, quietly, and felt the hand on his knee squeeze slightly in understanding and thankfulness.
He laid his own hand over it, covering it completely. He still thrilled in his heart at being able to do this, and he also had to admit that his nerves had quietened some more.
They sped along into the afternoon that was turning into early evening, and quite a bright one with a clear sky that could be appreciated better without obstructions, if that was your cup of tea, along narrower roads and increasingly more picturesque landscapes, heading for the destination that Crowley had in mind.
It wasn’t Lower Tadfield.
Even though there might certainly be reasons to go to Lower Tadfield, such as the general feel of love that Aziraphale still claimed or the people they’d met that still lived there, it wasn’t his intention to go there.
For what he wanted to do, he needed somewhere a little more…out of the way. Or at least, seeing as the south of England wasn’t exactly sparsely populated, as a rule, he needed somewhere where there was no Antichrist about that might show up to ask what they were doing.
He wanted a bit of privacy. That wasn’t too much to ask, was it?
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It was that special time of evening just before the sun decided it was done for the day. They had only just pulled in somewhere, where the nearest town was a mile or two away all around, there were no nearby farms or obstructing woods. Just pleasant landscape all around the vantage point that Crowley had picked.
Aziraphale, sitting in the passenger seat, looked around him, clearly not finding what he was expecting to see.
“Crowley – “he began, sounding just a little bit…concerned, perhaps, but the demon interrupted him before he could get further.
“I said I’d take care of the food, Aziraphale,” he said as the car shut off, “and I have, so don’t worry about it.”
With that, seeing as it was obviously on his mind and he’d need to bring it, instead of getting out of the car, he reached behind him and down. With a flexibility that ought to have been difficult, at the very least, grabbed hold of the hamper and pulled it around, holding it up at the same time.
If he was a little bit pointed about it, so what?
“Oh.” Aziraphale looked more than a little embarrassed. He looked down at his lap, his fingers twiddling on the handle of the basket he’d brought. “It seems that I might not be able to eat the food, seeing as I keep putting my foot in my mouth.”
It’s fine.”
“It’s not fine, it’s – Crowley!”
Aziraphale called out his name because the demon had got out of the car with his usual speed and dexterity, despite being hampered by a lidded wicker basket.
Come on,” he called just before the door shut behind him, sauntering his way towards a lovely looking spot that would give them quite the perfect view, around and, not unimportantly, up.
He heard the passenger shut and presumed the other was about to join him. While he would’ve liked to walk up there with Aziraphale’s hand in his, he also wanted to find the perfect spot himself, without being interrupted.
That and get his suddenly galloping nerves reined back in a little, of course, if he could.
As he spread the blanket – more of a duvet style of thing, with a few extra things added on, because just because you’d decided to dine outside on the ground didn’t mean you had to be uncomfortable, did it? – out on the ground, he picked up that Aziraphale had stopped moving.
He straightened back up and turned to look, a part of him just a little bit worried about why.
What he found was Aziraphale stopped, basket in hand, looking out over the area which, Crowley had to admit, they had a very good view of from up here. Both of the landscape and the sun setting over it, not a cloud in the sky to obstruct it.
“Strikes you, doesn’t it?” he said as Crowley sauntered up close to him, hands in his pockets. “Even though you’ve seen it unimaginably many times before, it can still be as beautiful as that very first time it happened.”
“Every time since, really,” Crowley commented. “Either none are beautiful, or they all are.”
“True,” Aziraphale agreed, voice and smile soft.
They stood for a few moments, just watching it, taking it in. Enjoying it and each other.
Then the ginger walked back towards the blanket, which now quite mysteriously was packed with just about everything he’d brought. Equally strangely, there was still room for the two of them to sit on it, though not with their legs, despite the spread that could only be described as ‘abundant’.
He sat down, his heart in his throat, hoping he’d got it at least somewhat right.
Which really was stupid. This, at least, he knew he’d got right. Not only had he possibly got every type of picnic-appropriate thing put out on the blanket, and then some, but he knew his angel well at this point and knew that something of quality, food or not, that was made for him was bound to be approved of.
Had he thought about it, he would’ve likely realised that it was almost certainly the nerves from what he had planned for after their ‘light’ dinner that were bleeding over into this.
Aziraphale joined him, sitting himself down opposite, where Crowley had made room for him. Just like they always did. Well, almost always. At least, there was space between them wherever they sat. It had got to be less in the last half a year but well, with everything else, he didn’t want to overdo it.
It was probably, no, unquestionably being overly cautious but at the time, he didn’t see it as such.
Only this time, while the blond did sit where he’d been given a space, it seemed that it was somehow much closer to the ginger than what he’d intended, what he’d made room for, while the spread remained unaltered.
Crowley wasn’t about to complain, he just...he’d thought that with this being so different from what they’d done before, with no concert or play to distract them and not a drop of alcohol drunk between them yet, on an actual date, Aziraphale might find it one thing too many, one step too close to also be sitting as close as they’d done on many occasions now.
Apparently not, though, if not just the fact that he’d sat himself down where he had but the ease with which he’d done it, no hesitation, as well as the smile still on his face.
One might think that the smile was because of the food but as blue eyes were meeting yellow through tinted glasses, it seemed unlikely.
For a long moment, he sat there, immobile. Then he reached across and again placed his hand on top of Crowley’s.
“Thank you,” he said, and there was more packed into that small sentence than the ginger had expected. It felt like he was being thanked for more than just the spread or even the picnic.
“You’re welcome,” he managed to reply, smiling in turn. He was purely smiling, though, not colouring. Not in the slightest. “Go on, then. Eat some. It’s not show food.”
It does look absolutely scrumptious I have to say,” Aziraphale enthused as he looked it over. He put one or two things carefully on the plate beside him, then picked up a jar of something to examine it. “I didn’t know there was anywhere that sold a hamper like this.”
“There isn’t.”
The angel looked up from the jar, realisation dawning.
“My dear…” he said softly, and it really shouldn’t be allowed to pack that much into just two words. Especially not when it wasn’t clear just what exactly was meant.
Oh, the understanding and the gratefulness were both clear enough but as for the rest of it…
The poor demon had to swallow and had to remind himself not to wet his lips.
“Eat,” Crowley said, glad of his glasses that hid his eyes looking just about anywhere else because he couldn’t right now.
He reached out and grabbed something without looking and brought it to his lips. Due to sheer luck, it was something that could be eaten as was and he bit into the scotch egg without relish. Or any other type of condiment, really.
Aziraphale looked at him for an achingly long moment, then smiled and began to fill his plate.
So did Crowley after he’d finished off the scotch egg. Though they as supernatural beings didn’t get hungry and eating was more of Aziraphale’s indulgence than his, he found himself piling more on the plate than he normally would – that he didn’t eat as much as the angel didn’t mean he didn’t eat at all – and what was more, digging into at least most of it.
That seemed to delight Aziraphale for some reason and he placed the occasional morsel from his own plate over on Crowley’s, who in turn made sure to pick up the offered treat as the next thing he ate.
By and by, the food Crowley had brought was eaten, between comments, big and small and completely irrelevant, and discussions, laughter and the occasional touch that was no less meaningful or appreciated for not being constant.
As they ate and talked, they also watched the sun disappear completely beneath the horizon, gradually calling back its tendrils of colour, who darkened as they ran, and the bolder ones even changed colours altogether.
Behind them came night, this time rolling in slowly and majestically rather than jumping and skipping along or racing as if it had got out of bed too late and was in a hurry to reach its destination.
They were even lucky enough to have a few stars come out as night-time came.
As they became visible, Crowley shifted where he sat, feeling a sense of unease creep up on him, but not for the reason that Aziraphale evidently thought, judging by the way he clutched the hand wrapped around his and tried to gently run his thumb back and forth over the patch of skin it touched.
It would be a guess but given what they were looking at, it didn’t seem that big an assumption to make; that Aziraphale was worried he was uneasy being ‘confronted’, as it were, by evidence of his life Before.
Crowley wasn’t going to deny that he did think about it at times or that he wasn’t affected by them, both positively and negatively, much as he didn’t want it to.
At the same time, not only hadn’t he been the sole builder of stars – the paperwork alone on managing all that would’ve caused anyone to Fall, he felt – and consequently weren’t necessarily responsible for what he could see on any given night, he’d watched the night sky so many times over the millennia that…
Well, it hadn’t stopped hurting, but it had dulled, in a way, and become at the very least something he could look at and even contemplate without feeling small and lost, let alone outright pained.
That said, he appreciated both the consideration and the gesture on the angel’s part.
No, the unease, the nerves, were to do with the realisation that they were nearing the end of the meal and therefore also nearing the next step in the plan. The plan which he still wasn’t sure how the other would react to.
Could he just put it off a little bit longer?
Well, yes, of course. He could put it off for eternity, if that’s what he wanted. If he was honest with himself, however, and stripped away the fear and nerves that were doing at least part of the thinking for him, then he knew that he didn’t want to. It hadn’t been a sudden impulse or idea, after all, but something he had wanted for a long, long time.
Putting it off for just a little bit longer wasn’t going to change anything, either. Not the issue and not how he felt about it. If anything, it was in all likelihood only going to exacerbate the matter.
Procrastination was the thief of time, yes, but it didn’t even have the decency to leave a solution or a better feeling about it all behind.
It might be shot down and not happen but if he chickened out like this, it wasn’t going to happen anyway.
With all of that in mind, he took a deep, unnecessary breath and, not entirely intentionally, squeezed the hand in his.
He could do this. More importantly, he was going to do it.
Aziraphale looked at him, puzzled but evidently willing to wait for an explanation, even as he then stood up, keeping hold of the hand in his.
The ginger, after taking another breath, then tugged at the hand in question. Aziraphale followed his request and stood up as well, a little less fluidly than the noodle that was the demon but with a surprising amount of grace, nevertheless.
Once they were both upright, Crowley tugged again and led the other a little way away from the blanket.
The question in blue eyes grew larger still.
Crowley?” he asked, evidently hoping for an explanation.
I…ehm…”
No. No hesitation, no more second guessing. The worst that could happen was that Aziraphale said no and even if he did, he would do it kindly and with understanding rather than judgment.
It was Aziraphale, after all.
For all that he could be a bit of a bastard, Crowley not only loved him the more for it, he was never a bastard around such things.
“I wasn’t only planning to go all the way out here for a picnic,” he said, speaking calmly and at a normal pace, both of which was a bit of a surprise.
He might’ve expected the blond to make a comment but all he got was a patient, yet expectant expression and a small smile.
“I was actually planning, well, hoping that we could…could maybe, if you’re…”
Bless it, when did his tongue become a knot? Or rather, a positive jumble knot. Spit it out already.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to go flying. Together.”
The angel didn’t seem to react to that and for a split second, Crowley was unsure of whether he’d heard him. But he must’ve done, as he then noticed the blue eyes slowly but surely widening, possibly as realisation dawned.
It was on the tip of the forked tongue to take it back, to somehow annul it. He stopped himself, however. If he was going to do it, then he was going to go the whole way. Even if he ended up being the only one up in the sky.
The possibility that Aziraphale didn’t know what he meant was remote. There really weren’t many, if any, other ways you could interpret those words, were there?
Another deep breath and he made a further decision; he was going to go up there, whether the angel was going to join him or not.
You might not be able to claim that half a year was a long time since they’d last been ‘let out’, not in the context of their lives, but even so, he’d felt an itch in his shoulders ever since that day on the airbase tarmac.
And it would be good, not just to stretch them on the ground but flex the muscles of them, too, let them do they were intended to do for once.
He closed his eyes and let out a long, drawn-out breath of relief as he let go of something inside of him and felt the wings unfurl behind and around him with a silent roar.
It occurred to him, then, somewhat and perhaps unwisely belatedly, that maybe Aziraphale’s reaction had something to do with a fear, residual or not, that they would be spotted. Not by humans, that could be fixed. By upstairs or downstairs.
That conclusion seemed born out by the fact that the blue eyes had somehow only grown wider as they looked at him.
If they were going to strike them down, though, they would’ve done so already, surely? Quite apart from what they had already put them through, what with the trials and everything, they’d had plenty of opportunities in the last half a year.
Going for a flight wasn’t going to piss them off more than the rest of what they’d done so far, or so he’d thought when he’d contemplated it himself.
“Crowley…”
There was quite the evident amount of concern and apprehension in that one syllable, or so the demon would’ve said.
He sighed, heavily. There was convincing and then there was coercion or simply pushing someone into doing something they really didn’t want to do. He had no intention of doing either, not when it came to Aziraphale and their time together, much as it was sending small cracks through his heart.
They would mend, though. It was fine.
It was fine.
He let go of the hand in his, reluctantly but nevertheless, he did it. If he was going to do this on his own, he wasn’t going to drag the other with him, not even a little.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to, angel, or if you don’t feel safe going up. I can go up myself, it’d probably be safer – “
Before he could get any further, he was interrupted by the angel unfolding his own wings with an equally inaudible clamour.
There were certain benefits to being a demon. One of them was excellent night vision and so he could easily see the angel standing before him, wings spread out on either side before they came to rest, much like his own.
Without the threat of impending doom and obliteration, for the entire planet as well as them, looming over him, over them both, he had the opportunity to take in the shape of his friend and partner, with his wings, and the sight took his breath away.
Oh, to see those wings beat as they brought the angel up into the air properly and then stretch out as he glided across the night sky, occasionally pushing down with force yet still with grace to stay up.
If ever he’d been in doubt that he’d had a fantasy about seeing that, it evaporated at that moment. Not that that meant anything, really, at least in this particular context.
“I don’t believe I ever said I didn’t want to,” Aziraphale said. “Nor imply it, either.”
“Your silence was pretty telling,” Crowley countered, with just the merest hint of sharpness to his voice.
“Perhaps so, but that doesn’t mean it was indicative of the thing you assumed,” Aziraphale returned, with an equal hint of sharpness.
Then he paused, swallowed, and his voice softened when he spoke again.
“With that said, I do see how it wouldn’t necessarily come across as it formed in my brain, and that a silence can leave some very unfortunate implications in its wake that mere words very often, and for that, I honestly do apologise.”
He grabbed hold of the hand that had only just left his, gripping it even firmer than before.
Crowley expected him to say something more. Perhaps explain his reasoning for not feeling like he could go up there. Which wouldn’t gel with him having let his wings out but perhaps his had been itching same as the ginger’s and this had, if nothing else seemed a good opportunity.
What he did not expect was what he got; Aziraphale not saying a word as he took a step backwards, then another while still trying to keep hold of Crowley’s hand.
As the demon didn’t move, however, since he didn’t feel like he ought to, given what the other was trying to do, that proved impossible, even when they both stretched.
Crowley frowned, puzzled but hopeful. Was that – did that mean that –?
When Aziraphale closed his eyes and drew a deep, but quick breath, it seemed more likely and when air slammed into him and flowed around him as the large wings pushed it down with force and the distance wasn’t quite great enough, Crowley could no longer be in any doubt.
He watched, something constricting his throat, as Aziraphale rose into the air, born aloft by his wings that a certain subset of humans would unquestionably point out were entirely impossible; that with their size and construction they shouldn’t be able to carry something the rough shape and weight of a fully grown human.
Impossible included other such small titbits as being immortal and performing actual, honest-to-opposition miracles, whether benign or malignant, too, and they managed both of those well enough, didn’t they?
To be perfectly fair, it was probably at least a little more graceful to Crowley’s biased gaze than reality would record, but that hardly mattered.
What mattered was that it was happening and for that, he could have swayed like a kite that refused to pick up wind as it was run along to make it fly and Crowley would still have found it beautiful.
That wasn’t to say it was inelegant, regardless of the body shape of the angel. Just a, a little rusty, perhaps. Like something that you once excelled at but haven’t touched in long enough that not just your brain, but your body needs a moment or two to tap into what the dickens this was all about again.
Once that seemed to come back to him, he visibly relaxed. How exactly that was visible, given, well, everything, was something best left to someone with demonic night vision and very intimate, though not sexual, knowledge of the body in question.
Then, another thing happened that Crowley hadn’t expected and certainly wasn’t prepared for. Rather than hold his hand out for the ginger to take as he rose himself, Aziraphale instead grabbed the hand he’d been trying to hold onto earlier.
He didn’t pull or anything like it that would make the demon destabilise or otherwise risk staggering and stumbling, though, just held on as he waited, his wings beating a slow but steady rhythm, keeping him afloat in the air.
Crowley should’ve been up there to join him immediately, he knew. He wanted to, too, without a question, and he would’ve done, as well, if not…
If not for the tiny little issue that his body seemed to have shut down for its holidays and the front desk wasn’t taking any calls at the time.
This was not…
He had been so bloody nervous about all of this ever since he had first formulated it in his mind and suggested going on a date; he’d gone from being hopeful and sometimes even confident back to being a nervous wreck to then thinking in entirely defeatist terms about it and then swung back around to hopeful and start it all over again. Sometimes it’d switch up the order, of course, but otherwise, it had stayed.
All of that, over and over in his mind since Aziraphale had said yes to the date, and this was the result?
It wasn’t that he was…no, that wasn’t right. He was complaining, he just didn’t have any right to complain. Not when things had turned out more or less just like he’d hoped for, and he was more than fine with avoiding drama.
Drama when it was someone else could be interesting, might even fuel a tarnishing of a soul somewhere – he was a demon, he’d had a job to do – but drama when he himself was involved? No, thank you. He’d had more than enough of that in his life, he was going to avoid any further instances.
He guessed there was just the slightest sense of…anti-climax to things panning out like this.
Or perhaps anti-climax was the wrong word. Maybe it was more accurate to say that it felt like it was going too well and that it would come crashing down on him, if not right now then in not very long.
Or…oh, he didn’t know. It was too much, all too much to contemplate at once. It wouldn’t change anything, either, but that wasn’t the same as easily being able to push it out of his mind.
The hand that wasn’t already gripping his was extended towards him.
He looked at it, followed the line of the arm all the way until his eyes met those of Aziraphale. The ones that were smiling so softly, so warmly.
So lovingly.
There was no other word for it.
That broke through not just the thoughts thronging in his mind and making the start of an absolute racket, but his momentary stupor.
Right.
Pushing aside the small thought that it ought to have been him who’d asked Aziraphale like this, not the other way around, as petty and irrelevant in the circumstances, he grabbed the proffered hand without further hesitation.
Thankfully, pushing his wings down wasn’t something that required a whole lot of thought. Not none at all, mind, and he ran the risk of wobbling as much or even more than the angel in front of him. But he would gladly take that if it meant that he got to experience this.
He was in the air before he knew it, the hands in his gripping firmly. It certainly wasn’t him that was holding on tightly to the hands of the angel. Most definitely not.
Aziraphale didn’t say anything, not even when Crowley accidentally pulled a little higher than he’d intended in one go.
Only when the demon felt like he had it all under control – and he wasn’t as foolish as to let go before he was sure he had it under his control – did he let go…of one hand.
The whole reason he’d wanted this wasn’t for him to faff about on his own, now was it? One might argue ‘tricks’ but if that was what Crowley was after, he had plenty of things he could show off to his angel – and they were things that only he could do, too.
Hardly a competition, was it?
He changed the grip on the hand in his, just enough that it was much more secure. That and, well, interlacing your fingers always felt very comforting and, well, romantic.
It was a good thing that angels didn’t have excellent night vision as well, because it spared him from having his slightly reddened cheeks exposed. What light might be left from the disappeared sun was not enough to illuminate the demon’s face, thankfully.
His hand was squeezed gently and Aziraphale’s smile only broadened.
Shall we, then?” the angel asked, and Crowley nodded, ignoring the moisture in his eyes.
Despite it being Aziraphale who had got off the ground first, as it were, he let it be Crowley who took the lead on moving forward, beating his wings once, twice as he looked across the expanse of fields, trees and a small smattering of houses that constituted the nearest village, which included both a post office and a pub, and beyond.
All stretched out below them and around them, ready to be seen.
Not because he never had, though it had been a while since he’d last been on any flight, on his own or assisted by machines. That wasn’t the point.
The point was that he was going to see them with Aziraphale.
That made the difference. All the difference in the world, really.
He thought he saw something glow in the far distance and figured that that would be a good thing to start heading for. Not the final destination, of course, just the pointer to head for right now.
Taking a deep breath, he then set off, his grip on Aziraphale’s hand very firm, warm, a little sweaty and just about perfect.
There was the slightest of tugs in their clasped hands at that, but the angel kept pace with him almost immediately and despite the fact that they should’ve crashed right into each other, flying so close and on a line, nothing happened.
For a little while, they just sailed across the sky, floating in the air, in silence that was only theirs.
Crowley closed his eyes without meaning to, unable to help exhilarating in the sheer excitement and utter joy of being up here, letting his wings out to stretch and flex their muscles. The wind in his face, the sting in his lungs, the rushing through his feathers, the power underneath his wings as they rose a little.
Apart from those small noises right beside him, the almost deafening silence of everything around him, the everyday humdrum noises of an evening that hadn’t realised it had become night far too small to be heard up where they were.
All of it coming together to form something that was altogether so much more than the sum of its parts.
Something that was magical.
But it was only so because it was focused through the spectacular, unique prism that was his angel. Without Aziraphale, none of this would’ve meant even a fraction as much, if anything at all.
Speaking of that, he thought that maybe, if he concentrated on the right muscles and such, he could change the angle and maybe just –
Aziraphale, caught up in his own enjoyment, it seemed, must’ve felt the hand in his loosen. But even so, he let out an inaudible but visible gasp as he watched the demon suddenly fly beneath him, keeping perfect pace with him as they sailed on through the gathering night, his wings beating steadily.
Blue eyes slid across the entirety of the body beneath him and Crowley couldn’t help but spread out his arms as well, grinning just a little cockily.
Alright, so perhaps showing off wasn’t purely for when there were serpentine tricks to perform. Sue him.
Actually, that…nah. He’d got better things to do. Especially now.
Such as flying up above the other and circling all the around him, ending up right back where he’d started, but with a bigger grin than he’d had before.
Aziraphale’s mouth clearly said ‘show-off’, judging by the careful, somewhat exaggerated movements of lips, but despite the distance and despite the darkness around them, Crowley had no trouble seeing the warmth shining in the eyes that he knew so well.
He rose again but only so much that he was in front of Aziraphale, hovering high above the ground.
Luckily, the angel must’ve expected something like that to happen, as he slowed immediately before stopping completely, and thereby avoided crashing straight into the other.
Crowley flew in close and grabbed hold of both plump hands. He brought him up a little and then tugged, moving as he did so. The grin that now threatened to take over his face had nothing to do with cockiness and everything to with unadulterated joy and delight.
Aziraphale followed him, a smiling frown on his features as he didn’t quite understand what the ginger was getting at.
That soon became a laugh of delight as he caught on and moved with the demon, faster and faster as they spun round and round, like a celestial round-about, with the added benefit that they weren’t going to fall off and if they became dizzy from it all, it was easily fixable.
They were both laughing like idiots the entire time.
When they finally stopped, Crowley felt just the slightest bit dizzy, but he also felt outright giddy and joyous and the fact that his feelings were reflected on his most beloved face in the whole world. The entire universe, really.
Part of him wondered whether they ought to call it a night. Whether Aziraphale would want to call it a night, after everything.
Did Crowley want to call it a night? No, not at all. Not ever.
…And still have begged for more…
He had no idea where that had come from. No, actually, he did, with music accompanying it and everything. He just didn’t want to acknowledge it, that wasn’t the same thing.
Despite that, he couldn’t deny that he shared the sentiment, even as he tried to bury the wretched song deep where it might never resurface.
He did want it to go on all night, at the very least, if not longer. It wasn’t as though they were exactly hindered by the limits of other creatures with the ability to fly, was it?
On the other hand, though, he did recognise that a large part of the magic lay in it being such a limited time.
To extend it beyond the night would not only mean that they’d have to perform quite hefty miracles not to be spotted by anyone – as it was now, even with the clear sky they were flying in, they would, if they were spotted at all, be seen as weird birds or possible odd hang-gliders…oh, weren’t humans simply wonderful? – it would take away from the night.
From their date.
Which wasn’t what he wanted at all.
So, instead he could make the most of what he had, make it as memorable an experience as possible.
That did not mean that all it could be was showing off for Aziraphale.
He flew a little closer, with the intention of asking whether the angel wanted to make a swooping dive with him.
Before he got the chance to more than open his mouth, however, he was in for a shock that almost sent him crashing out of the sky; Aziraphale closed what distance remained between them and kissed him.
It wasn’t a short kiss nor a chaste one, either of which he would’ve expected from Aziraphale, if he’d expected anything at all. Which he hadn’t, mainly because he hadn’t dared to entertain even the glimmerings of such a thought. To do more was to only set himself up for unneeded disappointment, or so he’d thought.
This now…
This told an entirely different story, though, didn’t it? As well as saying that maybe he’d got it wrong. Possibly not entirely but quite significantly wrong, even so.
Quickly, he pressed back, as enthusiastically as he could without risking the other toppling over. His hands let go of the other’s as their tongues met, but though he’d intended to wrap the hands around the back of Aziraphale’s neck, only one managed that.
The other settled itself under and over the angel’s jaw, cupping it and allowing his thumb to brush across the entirety of the cheek, paying special attention to the cheekbone and the corner of an eye where it seemed as though some moisture had gathered.
It was him that pulled back after a small eternity, his eyes opening slowly…which was entirely lost on the other, seeing as he’d retained his sunglasses for the trip into the air.
“Well, that…”
“Shush,” Aziraphale said, without opening his own eyes. He placed a finger on Crowley’s lips for emphasis, even though they were definitely close enough to hear each other now. “Don’t go ruining it. Not yet.”
The demon let out a sharply indignant noise at that and pulled back a little further.
Ruining it! The bloody nerve of it – as though he would!
Then the angel did open his eyes and there was nothing but warmth and love in them, no anger or annoyance at all.
Well, to say that it was all that was in them was perhaps not quite true…
“You bastard,” Crowley murmured when he cottoned on, the downward pull of his lips transforming into a broad grin in an instant. “You – “
“At your service, my dear, always and ever,” Aziraphale smiled back. After a moment, he asked, “Shall we head back, then?”
Crowley was about to say ‘yes’ – because just because they were headed back didn’t mean they had to take the straight route – when he spotted something flashing through the night.
“Not yet,” he said, his grin a positive beam now. “Come on, I want to try something!”
And what’s that?” Aziraphale asked.
Crowley didn’t answer, just grabbed the other’s hand and headed down.
That was to say, he dove down, in a swoop that was a bit too vertical for any kind of comfort. Nevertheless, Aziraphale followed him, keeping hold of his hand throughout and staying right beside him.
Down they flew, down and down and forward as well, until they were right above what Crowley had spotted; a train, though sadly not a steam train, moving through the night with a speed that was quite seductive and almost lent it a sort of grace as it sped across the rails.
They kept pace with it for a while, just because they could.
Once or twice, Crowley dropped down to look in on the passengers, which rather startled at least a few. There was one who merely waved to him, but as that was a child, with a sibling beside it who just frowned and stared, he had no compunction with waving right back to them before shooting back upwards, with perhaps more speed than he rightly needed.
When he emerged back up above the train, he looked around.
His heart seized when he at first saw absolutely nothing, not even a hint of angel as he looked.
Just as he was about to call out for him, however, strangled and, admittedly, desperate, his eyes caught on a mass of white. A familiar and incredibly welcome mass of white.
He dropped a foot or two out of sheer relief before he flew over to where Aziraphale was. Where he had sat himself down.
On top of the moving train. He was cross-legged but somehow managed to look as prim and proper as he always did when he had something more…chair-like with a seat to perch on instead.
Crowley alighted on the roof himself.
“What the heaven’s possessed you to sit yourself down on top of a moving train?” he asked once he had.
Aziraphale looked entirely innocent. “You were the one who wanted to follow it along like a couple of gulls trailing a ship.”
Gull? Gull? He wasn’t a bleeding gull!
What he said out loud was something else, though. “And you went along with me, which you didn’t have to if you didn’t want to.”
“Of course, I had to, don’t be silly,” the angel said, but his sniffy attitude was rather undermined by the way he reached across to grab Crowley’s hand again. The ginger definitely felt like he could get used to that happening far more often.
“What’s more and much more important, I wanted to,” Aziraphale added, a smile creeping back into his expression. “I just felt that while you flitted about scaring the life out of innocent passengers, I might as well get a bit of rest out of it.”
“As though you get tired – and isn’t it your job to stop me from doing things like that, anyway?”
The flight had lessened some tension between them, which had been more needed than Crowley had been aware of beforehand, and it was nice to just bicker back and forth a little.
That and the kiss had helped significantly in that regard, obviously.
“Scaring passengers is not very nice at all and even a bit juvenile but it hardly counts as evil, my dear, and certainly not something that needs thwarting.” The smile turned just the slightest bit mischievous. “Besides, I thought that we had retired. I believe you were rather adamant on that score.”
“Me? It was your idea.” Crowley wasn’t going to be goaded by something like ‘juvenile’.
“No, I am entirely certain it was yours, dearest, and you won’t persuade me otherwise.”
Crowley opened his mouth to argue, got as far as the first half of a syllable before he gave it up in mild disgust, turning it into a mocking grimace.
It only made the angel smile broader.
They stayed on the train for a few more miles, just taking in the scenery. As the first, faint but distinguishable glow of predawn began to suffuse the darkness around them, they looked to the landscape around them.
Then they looked at each other.
With a deep breath, their wings pushed down in unison as they set off, with surprisingly little issue for either of them, their timing meaning that they only just missed the tunnel the train was about to hurtle through at top speed.
They flew quietly but happily through the countryside, going past a town that might’ve qualified as a city, a few towns, quite a few villages and a whole lot of landscape, none of which looked remotely familiar to Crowley, who excused himself with the fact that it had been dark when they’d set out, completely ignoring the night vision, and besides, didn’t it all look the same?
He wasn’t worried, though. Not in the slightest. After all, he’d left his car in loads of places over the years and he’d always been able to find it.
It had always been in fine condition, too – and if he returned now and found that it wasn’t, for whatever reason, then he would make the little punks who’d so much as thought to damage it or even take it regret the day they had ever been conceived.
And if Aziraphale made any comment, he would ask, innocently, about if someone hurt his books.
He squeezed the hand in his, unable to fight the beaming smile of utter joy on his face as they flew back towards the car, the angel taking the lead this time.
For a first date, it had been almost, definitely entirely perfect. Every other date from now on certainly had a lot to live up.
…Well, then. He liked a challenge.
.............................................................
The car turned out to be fine.
When they finally located it about a mile or two away from where their picnic blanket still lay, undisturbed. Mostly fine, at least.
Aziraphale never asked where Crowley went one afternoon about a week later, which he had spent polishing and pampering his car despite the fact that he could and had fixed it completely with one single glare at the dents and scratches, and the demon never volunteered the information.
It was better and easier for both parties that way, and there was no need to spoil the mood.
Not when they had had such a beautiful trip out of it.
Aziraphale was already planning for another ‘date’, one which he hoped could do the first one proper justice.
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Hope you like and it even remotely lives up to what you hoped it’d be.