Chapter Text
Can you hear me screaming for you?
I’m afraid I’m gonna die down here
I can’t save, I can’t save myself,
Get me out!
Get me out of hell!
I’m suffocating, waiting for you,
‘Cause the angels don’t fly down here
I need you because no one else can
Get me out!
Get me out of hell!
-Skillet, “Out of Hell” (2016)
It was a rather stormy afternoon on the day of the pancake debacle, before.
Crowley’s kitchen was much more modern than Aziraphale’s, and with a much more open counter space, the angel thought bitterly as he stabbed at the bubbling mass that was ardently refusing to budge with a spatula. He poked his tongue between his teeth and cursed the infernal thing, grunting unhappily.
“Everything okay over there, angel?” Crowley asked from the sink, where he was absentmindedly washing the pan he’d just scrambled eggs in. He peered at Aziraphale from over the rims of his sunglasses, which he wore, even inside his own flat, as it seemed.
“No!” Aziraphale threw his hands in the air. “I can’t get the stupid thing to flip! I’ve nearly broken the damned spatula in half trying to just get it under the thing! And even when I do manage to flip it, I do it much too early, and the batter oozes everywhere I don’t want it to go!” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I don’t believe pancakes are going to be on the menu tonight if this continues, my dear.”
Crowley rolled his eyes, and dried his hands on the apron he had on, the one Aziraphale had brought for him that had “Hot Stuff Coming Through” emblazoned on the front.* (It had been a Christmas gift.**)
(*It was a terrible yellow color, almost fluorescent, and it hurt if you looked at for too long.)
(**This was also the Christmas Aziraphale had taken it upon himself to decorate Crowley’s flat with decorations that even the demon knew to be offensively inaccurate. He’d teased Aziraphale about this fact, but the angel had waved it off, insisting that it was the spirit of the season, the joy of it all, that truly mattered. This was also the year Crowley had walked in and found that Aziraphale had wrapped a string of twinkling colored lights around the large cactus in the corner Crowley had been cultivating for the last 20 years. He’d pretended to be angry, but in actuality, it had really done the flat some good having a little light.)
“Away,” he commanded, waving his hand in a shooing motion. He took the spatula from Aziraphale’s hand, and sat it on the counter before Aziraphale could smite someone*, or use it to assault the offending bubbling mass of pancake batter in the frying pan, or throw it out the window onto any unfortunate passersby below.
(*Crowley could not have Aziraphale smiting in front of his houseplants, least they became more afraid of the angel than they were of Crowley.)
He took hold of the handle of the frying pan, and flicked his wrist. He flipped the pancake into the air, where it somersaulted a few times before falling back towards the earth; Crowley caught it with practiced ease. Aziraphale stared at him.
“How did you get the bloody thing to do that?!” He demanded.
“Simple!” Crowley gave him a wicked grin. “Once you’re threatened to beat it senseless with a wooden spoon in an effort to summon the dead enough times, it usually submits.”*
(*He’d never actually threatened his cookery at all. The more proper terminology would be that he’d rather seduced his various pots and pans by promising loving care and cleaning, and proper aeration should they cooperate, as well as a bimonthly soak in a soapy sink. Cookery, Crowley had found, were much harder to frighten than houseplants.)
Aziraphale crossed his arms haughtily and huffed. Crowley gently deposited the slightly charred pancake onto the plate Aziraphale had set beside the stove. He ladled more batter into the pan, and turned towards Aziraphale.
“Try it.” He said.
Aziraphale, not about to be shown up by the rather incorrigible demon beside him, stepped up and wrapped his fingers around the handle of the frying pan. He watched as the edges of the batter began to bubble, which usually indicated that you should flip it onto the other side, and lifted it off of the burner. He gave it a yank upwards, as Crowley had done, and the pancake flew into the air.
Instead of somersaulting, like Crowley’s had done, however, the pancake instead splattered against the ceiling, where it promptly held fast, and did not fall.
The angel and demon stared up at it for a few moments, blinking. Aziraphale frowned.
“Bugger,” he cursed.
Crowley let out a roar of laughter, clutching his stomach as he doubled over. His sunglasses sank down his nose, nearly falling, and he grabbed the side of the counter to steady himself.
“Oh, that’s too good!” He said, wiping his eyes and resetting his sunglasses.
“It is most certainly not funny, Crowley!” Aziraphale glared at the demon.
“Oh yes it is,” Crowley insisted. He laid a hand on Aziraphale’s arm. “Lighten up, Az, it’s just a pancake.”
“Bugger it all,” Aziraphale grumbled. “I’ll have to scrape it off now.”
“Do it later.” Crowley said, turning back to the stove. He pushed his rolled sleeves further up his arms and poured more batter into the pan. In the time it had taken Aziraphale to attempt to make just one pancake, Crowley managed to make six. He stacked them on the plate, and grinned at Aziraphale, who rolled his eyes.
“Oh, c’mon, ‘s not that bad.” Crowley offered. “Now let’s eat; I’m starving.”
Aziraphale grabbed the two other plates, heaped with scrambled eggs and ham, and followed Crowley out into his dining room, where syrup and butter awaited them. A bottle of wine also sat there, two empty glasses awaiting their arrival, and Crowley wasted no time pouring it between them.
They sat and ate in companionable silence for a few moments, Aziraphale still fuming about the pancake debacle, grumbling about the mess that would result from having to clean it off later.
“You can just miracle it away, if you’re that worried about it.” Crowley drawled.
“It’s the principle of the thing.” Aziraphale insisted.
Crowley rolled his eyes. “Bugging Principality, obsessed with principles.” He took a long sip from his wine. There was no malice in his voice, only mild teasing.
Aziraphale said nothing at the quip, and instead drank his wine, watching the demon across the table from him over the rims of his own glasses. Crowley must have noticed his gaze, because he raised an eyebrow in the angel’s direction.
It had been two years since the Apoca-wasn’t, since the whole mess with Adam Young and the end of the world had happened. In that two years, Aziraphale and Crowley had found themselves spending more and more time together outside of Arrangement detailings. Over time it had evolved past what it had been for the last six millennia – a game of angelic cat and demonic mouse, as it were – from drinking comrades to a much more intimate sort of companionship. Eventually they’d found themselves where they were now, all fond glances and brushing arms as they occupied the same space, quiet words whispered against skin in the dark as they shagged on the small couch in the backroom of Aziraphale’s bookshop*, shared dinners and brunches and bottles of wine. Two lives that had always been entwined, more so now than in any way before.
(*Crowley had expressly forbidden any shagging in the Bentley.)
It was nice, what it was. Whatever definition given to whatever it was they had, it was good.
Neither of them had heard anything from their higher ups Above or Below in the two years since the Apoca-wasn’t, of which they’d had a direct hand in. They could not be entirely sure, but they were sure Adam Young had had something to do with that when he’d put things back to normal. As far as either side was concerned, it seemed, so long as the two of them continued to fill their monthly quotas as dictated by their respective job descriptions, there was little they could do in the way of complaining. And neither angel nor demon were anywhere near brazen enough to bring up the subject.
“See something you like, angel?” Crowley teased.
Aziraphale smiled. “I was just thinking,” he said, slowly. “That this is nice.”
“What’s nice?”
“This.” Aziraphale gestured vaguely between them. “Us. It’s…rather nice, I’d say.”
Crowley hummed in agreement, and he sat down his wine glass.
“I can agree.” He said, and ate another pancake. “Though I have to admit, I keep wondering how long it can last.”
“What do you mean?”
“Think about it, Az,” Crowley said. He wouldn’t meet Aziraphale’s eyes. “Hell, they don’t much care what we demons do so long as we meet our quotas and don’t do anything overly stupid—”
“Like averting the apocalypse?” Aziraphale interjected.
Crowley ignored him. “—but Heaven, we both know that is a different story. You can’t possibly tell me they’d approve of you seeing me like this?”
“They didn’t much care that you and I have been correspondents and drinking companions for millennia,” Aziraphale pointed out.
“That’s not the point, Az.” Crowley said. “My point is, we’re a bit beyond just friends, now, yeah? So eventually, someone is gonna take notice of that Upstairs, and do you really think they’re going to be too happy about you colluding with a demon? And not just any demon, oh no, but me. I’m the original tempter, Aziraphale. That whole buggering mess with the apple was my fault. I’m the one who delivered the Antichrist unto the world. And you’re here shagging me on a fairly regular basis. Sins of the flesh and all that jazz.” He looked at Aziraphale seriously. “Can you honestly say they’ll like that?”
Aziraphale shrugged. “Crowley, honestly, I don’t know.” He laid a hand on Crowley’s. “But I can honestly say, my dear, that I don’t care.”
“Aziraphale, I don’t want you getting into trouble because of me.” Crowley said softly. “Not for me.”
“And I don’t believe that I will,” Aziraphale assured him. “So stop worrying about it. I won’t worry about it until I have reason to.” He smiled. “Besides, for all we know, it’s ineffable.”
Crowley rolled his eyes. “Ineffability my ass.” He said. “That an angel and demon should…”
“Should what, dear?”
“Should fall in love, Az.” Crowley said. “Doesn’t seem like it would be possible, a demon loving an angel, and an angel lusting after a demon.”
“It’s hardly lust if the love is returned, Crowley.” Aziraphale said calmly. “Love is not a sin. Not ever. We’ve had this conversation before.”
“I know that, Az,” Crowley said. “But sometimes…sometimes I get so caught up in thinking it can’t possibly get any better than it is that…”
“Hush.” Aziraphale stood and kissed Crowley’s forehead. “Don’t say anything else on the matter. We’ve nothing to worry about, and if we ever do, we’ll take care of one another, yes?”
Crowley opened his mouth to object, but finally just nodded.
Aziraphale smiled, and for moment, everything was alright.
Neither could have predicted what was to come.