Chapter Text
From: [email protected]
Found an interesting note about wineries in the valley. Can you advise on possible references and the interest of one librarian in attending such a locale?
- AJC
>>>
From: [email protected]
Crowley this is an inappropriate use of work email. Just text me.
Sincerely,
A.Z. Fell
Crowley: Want to go to the winery up north this weekend?
Aziraphale: It's a very mediocre winery
Crowley: But the company will be excellent
Aziraphale: Yes, fine. But I'd suggest the brewery outside of town. It's much better.
Crowley: Maybe next weekend?
Aziraphale: I'll pencil you in.
Alongside their standing lunches on Friday, now Aziraphale spent every Saturday doing something with Crowley. First it was the trip to Staunton, then the winery, then the brewery. Then he insisted on a tour of antique shops which she had to do a bit of planning for, but she didn’t mind. She didn’t go to the antique shops very often any more since she had a bit of a habit of putting too many things in her house and it was well-decorated enough as it was.
“I think I preferred the winery,” Crowley said, picking up a salt shaker in the shape of a pig as they wandered through the antique mall.
Aziraphale shot him a look and continued to poke through the jewelry tray. Sometimes there were some real finds at these places. “You wanted me to show you the antique malls.”
“I thought it would be, I dunno, more cool historical stuff and less pictures of clowns,” he said, sauntering over to her side.
“There will always be pictures of clowns,” she said, moving from the jewelry to the ascots and scarves display.
“Do you like scarves?” he asked. He dropped down to look through the green glassware on one of the shelves in the booth.
“Sometimes. It’s hard to find ones I like.”
“The vintage look suits you,” he said, rising to his feet and coming back to her side. “What about this one?” He flipped the edge of a gauzy light blue ascot. “You wear a lot of blue. It would look nice with your eyes I think.”
“Oh,” Aziraphale said, swallowing hard as their fingers brushed. “I’m not sure.”
He shrugged and moved away. “I’m sure there are loads of options around here. Could dress yourself up as a clown if you wanted. Dress me up as a clown if you wanted.”
“Are you making a request, Crowley?” Aziraphale asked, tugging on her cardigan to right herself as she trailed him out of the booth.
He rolled his eyes. “Oh, shut up.”
“What do you think we should read next?” Marjorie asked as she set aside her biscuit. It was her night hosting and she always had shortbread and tea. “I was thinking something a bit saucier.”
Aziraphale adjusted her glasses. “Marjorie, I am not reading another of your bodice rippers disguised as literature.”
“Says the Georgette Heyer fan,” Anathema scoffed.
Leah gestured to Anathema as if she’d made the most salient point in existence.
“Excuse me!” Aziraphale said. “I like a well-researched romance! And I would hardly recommend Heyer for book club. I do understand it’s not everyone’s cup of tea.”
“Does anyone want tea?” Marjorie asked.
When no one took up the offer, she sat back down.
“Aziraphale, you didn’t want to pick last time. What do you think?” Anathema asked.
“Mary picked last time so I suppose we should go in order? Who would be next?” she asked. “I don’t mind reading whatever someone else chooses.”
“Then I’m picking the romance,” Marjorie said happily.
Aziraphale supposed she had earned that.
October swiftly became November and the students became busier, the library was constantly full and Aziraphale’s work started to absorb her time, her only respite really being her time with Crowley and her Tuesday book club.
She was steadily starting to realize that she’d never had a friend quite like Crowley. She certainly had friends. She had a full life. But she didn’t have friends who texted her randomly at all hours, who went to shows with her, who shared her interests, who laughed so much with her. It was invigorating. It brought so much joy to her previously peaceful life. For so long, she had been content. Now, she was something like happy.
“Angel,” Crowley whined as he leaned against the circulation desk.
Well, mostly happy.
“You are a grown man, not a toddler. I told you I am busy and cannot get lunch today,” she said.
“What’s going to happen? Are the books going to rebel? Stage a coup? Will book society collapse in your absence?”
Aziraphale fixed him with a look over the tops of her glasses. “No, but I have a job to do and I will do it. Besides, I will see you tomorrow.”
Crowley perked up. “At your house still? I’m finally seeing your secret lair?”
“It’s not a lair,” she said. “Now shoo.”
He trotted out the eastern doors with a skip in his step, and Aziraphale shook her head at his antics.
“That’s cute,” Anathema said.
“What?”
“He really likes you,” she said, marking one of the full carts for students to take downstairs and begin re-shelving.
“We’re good friends I think,” Aziraphale said fondly, but Anathema had already disappeared into the backroom and didn’t reply.
Crowley walked in her house, and the first thing he said was, “I thought you worked in a library, angel, not lived in one.”
She huffed and moved a pile of books from one side table to her desk even though that didn’t really accomplish anything.
“I suppose the library is better organized,” he said, stepping into her sitting room and beginning to poke at the shelves that lined the walls on either side of the window beside her desk. “Oh! It’s you!”
Scowling, she looked up from her pile of books and found him wiggling her angel figurine at her. “That was a gift,” she said testily.
“It looks just like you,” he said with a grin before putting it back and then gasping in earnest as he dropped into a crouch. “Wait, is this actually you?”
He pulled a frame off the lower shelf. It was a picture of her from when she first moved in, her hair half up as she brought in her very first moving box. She had been wearing high waisted shorts and a striped tank top. Very embarrassing.
“Um, yes,” she said. “About twenty years ago.”
He touched the edge of the frame with gentle fingers before replacing it on the shelf. “You looked very cool,” he said, looking at her from under his lashes.
“Thank you,” she said with a prim sniff. “Mr. Sunglasses-inside.”
“Ugh,” he groaned. “Forget I ever told you that.”
“I don’t think I will,” she said. “Now, as promised, we are ordering pizza and watching this terrible film you insist I must see.”
“Goldfinger is not a terrible film, Aziraphale.”
“I’ll be the judge of that,” she said. “Do you want red or white wine?”
“With pizza? Red.”
“Oh, I knew I liked you,” she said, knocking their arms together.
He smiled again and she felt a strange lightness for a moment before he turned away to flop down on her old-fashioned sofa. He really was all starfish, limbs all akimbo before he pulled in slightly and patted the seat beside him.
“I’ve got to get the wine,” she said. “Why don’t you queue up the film?”
He snagged the remote from the end table, and she left the room to the soft fuzz of the TV turning on. Her chest was tight, an odd heat in her throat. She drank a glass of water and pulled out the delivery menu for the one pizza place in town that delivered. She was famished,certainly. She had eaten lunch early that day and it was later than usual for her to eat dinner.
When she handed Crowley his glass of wine, and sat beside him with her own, she pulled out her cell phone and said, “I was thinking a margherita pizza and…”
He took a deep sip of his wine and then said, as if hoping she would challenge him, “I don’t know about you but I’m a big fan of Hawaiian. Nothing better than pineapple on pizza.”
“Margherita and Hawaiian it is then. I must say I’m also partial to pineapple on pizza. I’m not sure what all the fuss is about,” Aziraphale said innocently just to thwart Crowley’s attempt to get a rise out of her, pulling up Sal’s number and dialing it.
With the order put through, they finally sat back and Crowley found other things to needle her about. The amount of books in the room, the crocheted blanket on her reading chair, her penchant to decorate with antiques. She would have taken issue with it, if it didn’t seem so utterly fond.
“No wonder you knew all the best antique shops,” Crowley said. “You were probably their best customer.”
“I like things with history,” she protested. “All those modern things have no personality.”
That sent Crowley off on a tirade about IKEA of all things, speaking louder and louder and gesticulating more widely.
Crowley’s hand was very large around the bowl of the wine glass, broad-knuckled, long-fingered. The tendons in the back of it were stark as he gestured widely to emphasize his point and Aziraphale’s eyes traced the movement before she realized she wasn’t paying attention. The wine was going to her head. She certainly needed to eat something.
“I’m sorry,” she said, putting out her hand to place it on Crowley’s forearm. It was bare where he had rolled up his sleeve. Warm. “Can you say that again? I drifted off there for a second.”
“A bit distracted, are you?” Crowley asked, smirking for some godforsaken reason.
“I think I’m hungry,” Aziraphale said and she set aside her wine to check the time. “The food will be here any minute hopefully. I shouldn’t have started drinking on an empty stomach. Horrible idea really.”
The knock at the door signaling the arrival of their food shouldn’t have been relieving as it was. Aziraphale rushed to her feet and paid the man before Crowley could even protest.
Pulling the coffee table closer to the sofa, she opened the boxes and gestured for Crowley to take a slice. “I can’t guarantee it will stand up to what you’re used to but I have no complaints.”
Taking one of the plates Aziraphale had retrieved from the kitchen, Crowley picked up a slice of Hawaiian pizza and took an obscenely large bite. Aziraphale bit back a laugh. He was going to burn his mouth. Silly man.
“S’pretty good,” Crowley declared after he swallowed. He had a bit of pineapple stuck in his teeth but Aziraphale was polite enough not to say anything.
She took two slices and settled back onto the couch. “Alright, I’m ready for your film.”
“Yeah, alright, but,” - he held up a hand - “I like these movies so don’t be mean about it.”
“I will do my level best.”
“Alright,” he said with a disbelieving snort, taking another slice of pizza and then pressing play.
She let herself be immersed in the film. Crowley wanted her to like it and no matter what he said to the contrary, she would try. It was when she set down her plate on the coffee table and leaned back against the couch that she bumped into the length of Crowley’s arm where he had extended it along the back of the sofa.
She frowned. Could she politely ask him to move? He seemed perfectly focused on the movie. In fact, he seemed to have migrated a bit towards the middle of the sofa, his arms stretched on either side of him. She rolled her eyes. Typical man, taking up space. It wasn’t as if he was crowding her or forcing her into a little corner of the sofa, but his arm was certainly against her upper back. She wondered if perhaps Crowley was simply the sort of tactile person that enjoyed the casual touch of his friends, and something like your forearm bumping against your friend’s shoulder was nothing to worry about. She rarely had occasion to be touched so she was hyper aware of the contact and unsure if it would be unspeakably rude for her to ask Crowley to put an end to it.
She rose to her feet abruptly.
“Aziraphale?”
“I’m going to refill my wine,” she said. “Could you pause it?”
A frown descended on his face as he moved to get up too. “Yeah, do you need-”
“I’ll be right back.”
When she returned, Crowley had retreated to his corner of the sofa, and she was able to breathe easy.
“Crowley,” she said when she took a seat. “I hate to inform you that you’ve been swindled.”
He looked at her, mid pour from the wine bottle, and frowned.
“The furniture man sold you a slab of concrete instead of a couch.”
A sharp laugh burst from Crowley’s mouth and he spilled a few drops of white wine on the hem of his soft gray t-shirt. He shook his head and pushed the glass into her hand. “Hey, but it looks nice don’t you think?”
They’d gone to Crowley’s on Friday night, a strange variation from their typical Saturdays which had transitioned somehow from weekly outings to weekly movie nights, but it was nearing December and finals week was coming up and Crowley said he had to work the weekend. Aziraphale had said they didn’t need to see each other at all, but Crowley had insisted.
“Oh, I don’t know. I think that looks aren’t all that matters,” she said with a polite sip. “If they were, you’d have absolutely no friends.”
Crowley gasped then fell into the seat next to her with more drama than usual. Which was quite a lot of drama. “You’re cruel! Insulting my looks after all this time.”
“It’s alright, my dear,” she said, patting him gently on the arm. “You’re very handsome and I’m sure you’re aware of it.”
“Maybe I only like to hear it from you,” Crowley said, voice peculiarly soft.
She drew her hand back quickly and said, “Well! What are we watching?”
“The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly.”
“A cowboy film.”
“Yes, angel. A cowboy film.”
“With Mr. East-Wood.”
“Yes with- are you having me on?”
“I’ve seen this movie, Crowley. I’m happy to watch it again if you’d like or do you enjoy this sort of education of one Miss Aziraphale Fell?”
Crowley made a choked off noise and turned back to the TV before taking a harsh sip of his wine. “Yeah, you could say that.”
“I’m easy to please, Crowley. Whatever you’d like. I do enjoy our movie nights.”
He extended a finger over the rim of his wine glass and tapped it against his lips. “How about something neither of us have seen?”
“That sounds wonderful,” Aziraphale said.
“You pick,” he said, handing her the remote to have her scroll through the endless sea of streaming titles.
She blinked at the gadget in her hand. “Oh, I-”
He waved at her to go on and when she didn’t, he sighed and sat forward, elbows on his knees. “What about that new Jane Austen adaptation? That seems your speed.”
She hesitated for a long moment before confessing, “I have wanted to watch that but it can hardly be something you-”
He blew a raspberry. “If you can do Bond, I can do Jane. Put it on.”
Smiling, and with more excitement than Crowley’s concrete couch deserved, she nestled back against the cushions and hit play.
Crowley ended up sprawled out on the couch again, but his couch was much larger so when his arm laid along the back, his hand only just brushed the ends of her hair.
She barely noticed really.
Crowley: Finals are hell
Aziraphale: I believe the students would agree
Crowley: It’s not even finals week properly and I’m skin and bones. Death arrives. He rides a pale horse.
Aziraphale: 💀
Crowley: !!!!!!!
Crowley: Send me another emoji immediately
Crowley: 🙀😍🤠
Aziraphale: Apologies. My emoji quota has been reached. May I interest you in a meme?
Crowley: Aziraphale I’m going into cardiac arrest over here. My stressed body can’t take it.
Crowley: Are we on for Saturday? Dinner at yours?
Aziraphale: Of course. 7 PM. Let me know if anything changes.
**
One of Aziraphale’s favorite things about Crowley was that he could cook. She knew her fair share of dishes; years of living alone had taught her the best way to make a white sauce. She had a decent bread recipe. None of it was particularly miraculous (except her toffee pudding which was her grandmother’s recipe and was divine), but it was passable and she enjoyed it. But Crowley, Crowley could cook. He seemed at home in the kitchen. He knew his way around spices that Aziraphale had never bothered to stock and that he’d been forced to bring from home once they started making things at her house.
Tonight was cottage pie (something Aziraphale did know how to make) and Aziraphale had been put on vegetable dicing duty. She had put an old record on in the main room, letting Ella Fitzgerald be the soundtrack for their activity. It was nice. Peaceful.
“Are you looking forward to Christmas?” Aziraphale asked as she put her chopped potatoes in the pot Crowley had directed her towards.
He shrugged and turned the pot on to boil. “It’s a lot of effort to go all the way back to England just for a week or so.”
“I can imagine,” she said.
“So you’re staying here then,” he asked, leaning back against the counter and looking down at her. She didn’t have her heels on inside, and she felt much shorter than normal.
“Yes. I have Christmas dinner with the Fosters usually and a few faculty have a New Year’s celebration. But you know me, quite the homebody,” she said as she stirred the carrots in the pan with a wooden spoon. She hadn’t celebrated Christmas with her family in years, not since her parents had passed, and hadn't minded it really except when she thought too hard about how a Christmas ought to be.
He pushed off the edge of the counter and tugged on the edge of her cardigan as if to draw her from her thoughts. “You could always give me a call. Day of,” he said. “I’ll sing you a Christmas carol.”
“Poppycock,” she said with a snort.
“You could sing me one,” he replied, grin spreading over his face. “I hear angels are wonderful singers.”
He took her hand and spun her to the music. She laughed, an almost horrifying sound, before clapping her hand over her face. “Crowley, what are you doing?”
“Making you laugh,” he said as he began to tilt her around the room in time to the music. “It’s working.”
“We need to stir the carrots,” she said, still laughing so hard that he began to laugh too before he finally released her, leaving her waist hot where he had touched her.
“Fine, I won’t force you to suffer through my dancing,” he said playfully, returning to the stove and picking up the wooden spoon to do as she said.
Crowley would leave for his Christmas holiday after finals week, and things would be a bit different. She had gotten so used to having him around constantly. There would be no weekly movie night with dinner, no pestering at work. She almost couldn’t imagine it.
Dinner was lovely, as she’d come to expect, and when they ended up on her couch with glasses of wine, she was warm and comfortable and happy.
“You can’t possibly have known,” Crowley said with a disbelieving grin, arm going along the back of the sofa. His body was tilted slightly towards her, relaxed, his leg kicked up on the seat of the couch, ankle crossed over his knee.
“No, that’s the best part!” she said, reaching out to keep his attention. His knee was warm under her palm. “He tried to sneak out with the prawns in his pockets.”
“Angel, I can’t,” he said, laughter muddying his words as he sucked in a huge breath.
“No! He did. It was just that the dogs -”
“Dogs?”
“Someone was walking their dogs and I suppose they must have smelled the prawns because they bit him in the...well, you know.”
“No,” Crowley said in disbelief.
“Yes!” Aziraphale said, falling into laughter.
Gesturing with his hand as if to urge her to go on, Crowley ventured, still grinning, “In his…”
“Yes, his…”
“Do you mean his…” Crowley’s eyes went wide.
“Yes, his, well-”
“So his thigh?” he said definitively.
“Crowley.”
“What?” Crowley said, all innocence. “I can’t read minds.”
“His balls! Crowley, they bit him in the balls.”
Crowley burst out laughing. “I didn’t think you’d say it. Fuck. I thought you’d say groin. I really did.”
His laughter caught her then and she laughed too, embarrassed and amused in equal parts. Her hand went to grasp his arm where it rested along the back of the couch to steady herself as she folded in on herself, trying to catch her breath.
“You miserable wretch.”
“You like me,” he teased.
“I think you’d be hard pressed to prove it,” she said, trying to be serious and failing. She was smiling so hard her cheeks hurt. As she relaxed against the couch and their laughter tapered off into silence, she realized Crowley’s hand was resting beside her cheek. Before she could move, Crowley pushed her hair back from her face, and she frowned. She reached up to touch her temple, and their fingers brushed. "Oh, do I have something-"
Their hands tangled, and Crowley leaned in close, brushing their mouths together, the touch of his mouth hot and unexpected as he pushed closer, his other hand coming to grasp her waist as he deepened the kiss. He tasted of sweet wine, and his fingers were soft on her temple before he pulled back. When he spoke, he sounded awestruck. Wrecked.
“Aziraphale, that was…”
His voice was what finally brought reality crashing back down on her. His mouth just there, his body warm and closer than it had ever been. She couldn’t think. He was holding her and touching her face and she couldn’t - She pushed him back gently with the hands she still had pressed against his chest, and a dreadful ache began in her stomach. "Crowley, what are you doing?"
He kept brushing her hair back, knuckles grazing her temple, eyes searching her face. "Kissing you."
She stood and shook her head. He wouldn’t do this unless he had a reason. Christmas season, all his work. She didn’t know. "Crowley, I-I know you've been stressed. Perhaps there’s something to be said for looking for that sort of...relief. You have a lot on your plate with finals and upcoming travel and - and... The holiday season is a difficult time for a lot of people and if you’re looking for that sort of company, I’m sure there are plenty of willing girls in town who would jump at the chance."
"Plenty of willing-" Crowley skipped through a series of horrified consonants and surged to his feet. "I'm not going to sleep with someone else when I'm dating you."
Aziraphale's head spun for a moment and she regretted ever having stood up for this conversation. "Since when are we dating? Crowley, I'm sorry if you've misunderstood, but I'm ten years your senior. I've only ever thought of you as a friend."
Turning a pale shade of gray, Crowley looked about as woozy as Aziraphale felt. "What does your age have to do with anything? I like you."
Aziraphale rolled her eyes. "Please, Crowley, you know what you look like. What the young professors of universities get up to. You can have anyone you want, grad student, some lovely girl in town. Just look around on campus at all those young men sleeping with girl after girl because they can."
"This doesn't sound like it's about your age," Crowley said, some color back in his cheeks. "It sounds like it's about mine. I'm not some frat boy trying to get his rocks off.”
Gaping at him, unsure what to do with her hands, Aziraphale took another step back, and he sighed, passing a hand through his hair. “I like you, Aziraphale. I've liked you since you stormed into my office and shouted at me and maybe you've never thought of me that way but if you could...would you?"
Aziraphale's stomach grew hot, uncomfortably so and she looked at the floor. "I don't know. I need...I need to think."
Crowley gathered his coat and walked to the door. It couldn’t end like this, his back to her with no kind words between them. She took an unsteady step forward. She had to ask, "If I can't, would you still...want to be friends?"
Crowley laughed, but it wasn't cruel. "I might need some time to get my head on straight about it but - yeah, of course. There's nobody else like you, Aziraphale."
The door closed and Aziraphale collapsed onto her sofa, hand over her mouth. She was a fool of the worst sort.
Would she lose him? She couldn’t bear the thought.
Would it be too much to try this? If she had known he had wanted this from the start, perhaps she could have seen things differently.
Before long, her shoulders began to shake with silent sobs as every interaction over the last several months began to play in her mind in a very different light.