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Chapter Text

Hello dearest friends and family! If you received this letter, then you’ve been chosen to spend ten magical days of Christmas in paradise with us, celebrating the most wonderful time of the year and the never ending, cosmic bond our souls share!

And worry not, do you think we’d let you get bored? Each activity is optional, but fun is mandatory! Make sure to pack sun cream, bathing suits and a big enthusiasm!!
We can’t wait to have you all here!! Let the love flow!!

XOXO, Gabriel and Rory - soulmates and twin flames 

“Twin flames,” Aziraphale mutters to himself, folding the letter in his lap. “Let the love flow.” 

He won’t even think about all of the exclamation points. 

There is more in the envelope. He can spot what looks like a leaflet and a smaller, square piece of paper. He picks the latter, merely hoping for less exclamation points. 

Aziraphale!!! My dearest baby brother!!!

Well. 

This is your personal invitation, make sure to bring it with you to the resort, or they won’t let you in. You know, exclusive and everything. My treat, of course!!!

Of course. 

I’m not asking you to be my best man, since Rory and I believe in equality and don’t want our guests to suffer the implication of a hierarchy. But, you’re my brother, I had to do something special for you!!! So I have reserved you a whole…bungalow!!! Near the main house where me and Rory and his family will stay!!!

Delightful. 

And it’s big enough for two people. I know you’ve been hiding something, you big dog. Bring the man!!! Give me a ring as soon as you can. I’ll see you soon baby brother!

Aziraphale puts the piece of paper on his desk, along with the previously folded letter and the rest of the content of the envelope. He loosens his bow-tie, reclining on his chair. Then, head buried in his hands, he enjoys a very satisfying private scream. 

He takes out the leaflet. Wedding bells, flamingoes, clownfish and seashells decorate the border of the front page, a big, glittery RORIEL FEST! proudly on the top. Aziraphale’s left eye twitches.

“Alright,” he breathes out. “Let us see.” 

Each page of the leaflet is dedicated to a specific day. Apparently, Rory and Gabriel managed to reserve multiple rooms and beaches on the exclusive resort for their… fest. Each day is packed with activities and meals and group bonding experiences. The guest schedule is packed from dusk till dawn. 

Aziraphale loses the bow-tie altogether, freeing two buttons as well, and refocuses on the schedule. “I can do this.” 

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me a… zumbaaaa class! 

He immediately skips to the second day.

Finger painting morning extravaganza! 

Ocean themed movie marathon! 

Arts and Crafts with Rory! 

Aziraphale’s nose twitches. He opts to skip day three and four, and hops to the fifth, since five is, historically, his favourite number. 

Karaoke day!!! Gabriel’s favs!!!

Well then. His throat is already dry, and he’s barely halfway through. He just skips all the way to the end. End his sufferings and everything; he’s always believed euthanasia to be medical care. 

On the last day of Christmas… true love comes to you!!! Join us for the best day of our life on the Roriel Beach! Tissues strongly recommended!!!

“Hm.” He says. He stares at the leaflet, the left bottom corner crumpling under the strength of his white knuckle grip. He keeps staring, the hustle and bustle of London outside drowning the white noise in his ears. He lets go of the leaflet, and screams again.

Obviously, that’s where the bell above the shop door dingles. He should have remembered the number one rule of being a shopkeeper: the mental breakdowns are reserved to the backroom. 

“Closed!” He calls out, muffled by his hands. He can’t be bothered, not today. Not that he is ever particularly bothered. 

“Er, I have those Austen first editions you’ve been after for months?”

Oh, of course. Of course it couldn’t have been the religious solicitor he usually scares away in mere seconds. 

Aziraphale lowers his hands. “Oh. Crowley. Hello.” 

Crowley is a friend. If Aziraphale were to be honest, Crowley is his dearest friend. They met ten years ago at a book fair in Paris, and Aziraphale still isn’t sure what Crowley’s job is. He says he’s a professional finder: his clients want something, he finds it for them, he gets paid, everyone is happy.

The first thing he found for Aziraphale was a misprinted Bible everyone in the misprinted Bible community (yes, it does exist) thought was just a myth. Aziraphale did too, and honestly only hired Crowley for laughs. Yet, two weeks later, the man sauntered into his shop, ever present sunglasses and black ensemble in check, a fedora, of all things, hiding the shock of red hair and, under his arm, the legendary Buggre Alle Bible. Aziraphale had not blinked for three full minutes. Then, he offered Crowley a glass of wine. Crowley accepted. 

They’ve been friends ever since.

It always goes like this: Aziraphale muses out loud about some kind of rare book he’s after, Crowley hums and says he’ll find it, Aziraphale says he’s not asking, Crowley waves a hand and two to three weeks later, he saunters into the shop with the book under his arm, Aziraphale closes the shop and they drink wine or tea or hot chocolate and talk about everything and nothing until one of them, usually Crowley, falls asleep on the settee in the back. 

Ten years like this, and Crowley has become his dearest friend. Aziraphale has stopped paying him after that first Bible, not for lack of trying. Crowley just waves a hand and demands a glass of something, and that’s it. Aziraphale just enjoys seeing his friend and getting rare books for free.

“Were you screaming?” Crowley walks up to his desk, depositing the first editions on Aziraphale’s desk, and points at the discarded bow-tie. “Why are you naked?” 

Aziraphale sighs, walking up to the door to turn the sign on Closed. Normally, he would be overly excited about the new books, demanding a full day of no disturbances to properly assess them. Not today. “I’m opening the Shiraz.”

Crowley whistles. “Is this a Shiraz kind of situation?” 

Aziraphale doesn’t reply, and Crowley follows him to the back room, where they assume their usual positions. Crowley on the settee, legs up and everything, Aziraphale in the armchair, pouring the wine in the glasses on the little coffee table. “This is an ethylic coma kind of situation.”

Crowley’s mouth twitches, and his throat makes that clicking sound it makes when he doesn’t want to laugh at something Aziraphale said. “What’s up?”

Aziraphale downs his first glass as if it were a shot. It goes against every single one of his beliefs about savouring, but needs must. He pinches the bridge of his nose and takes a deep breath. “My brother is getting married.” 

Crowley, like a normal person, takes a sip. “Right. Congratulations?”

Aziraphale clicks his tongue. He pours another glass. “My former homophobic brother, who stopped interacting with me fifteen years ago aside from the lovely death threats he sent me twice, is getting married to a man.”

Crowley stares. He puts down both the glasses and his feet, assuming a more or less normal sitting position. He even removes his glasses, discarding them somewhere on the settee. “Former homophobic brother.” 

Aziraphale hums. “Yes, well. He’s been to therapy. Apparently he was just repressed and had anger management issues.” Aziraphale downs his second glass. “He found the light or something. And then got engaged to his therapist, so I guess it went well.” 

Crowley keeps staring. It’s worse without the glasses. Aziraphale can see the horrors he’s feeling reflected into Crowley’s deep brown eyes. “I don’t think an ethylic coma is enough, actually.” He leans forward and takes the glass, already full again, from Aziraphale’s hand. “But let’s slow down a tick, maybe.” 

Aziraphale rolls his eyes, but doesn’t protest. He sighs as he burrows deeper into his armchair. “Obviously, he invited me. A ten day long Christmas wedding extravaganza in some Maldivian exclusive resort.” He laughs. “His treat, obviously.” 

“A ten day long Christmas wedding extravaganza.” Crowley echoes. “That must be the most insane sentence I’ve ever heard you uttering.” 

“In the Maldives. The beach theme is important.” He waggles two fingers in the direction where they came from. “There’s a leaflet on my desk.” 

Crowley immediately shoots up. “May I?”

“Be my guest.”

It’s mildly amusing to observe Crowley’s facial reactions to the Roriel Fest. His eyes go from bemused to disgusted to confused to downright horrified. He looks up. “Why aren’t they institutionalised?” 

Aziraphale, at least, giggles. “This is a nightmare.”

“Zumba class? Arts and crafts? Karaoke?” Crowley’s voice gets progressively higher. “Is this a horror movie setting? Do they kill the guests and serve human meat at the reception? No, seriously, have you ever seen Midsommar?” 

Aziraphale rubs circles into his temples. The two glasses shot down on an empty stomach after a mental breakdown were, perhaps, not his brightest moment. “Have you seen the exclamation points?” 

“I think the glittery Roriel is worse.” Crowley grimaces. “Are you sure you two are related?” 

“Well, I do have the scar on my knee to remind me of when he pushed me off of my newly gifted bicycle just because he wanted to be the only one with a bicycle, so.” Aziraphale says. “A hundred percent blood related. Unfortunately.” 

Crowley twirls the leaflet in his hands, muttering zumba to himself almost rhythmically. “Are you going?” 

Fair question. Aziraphale lets a moment pass, teeth sinking into his lower lip. “I don’t think so.” 

Crowley hums, and tops off Aziraphale’s glass, having seemingly changed his mind about slowing down. Aziraphale wonders whether zumba or karaoke are to blame. “I mean, ten days in the Maldives, skipping the whole…” he wiggles his fingers around a bit. “Jolly good time here, and paid by your arsehole brother.”

“Can you honestly picture me in a zumba class?”

Crowley’s bodily shudder at the word ‘zumba’. “You could just… pretend to be injured or something.” He sits up straighter and clears his throat. “I do apologise brother dearest, I took a terrible tumble the other day, you see. I’m afraid I can only rest poolside and sip cocktails with tiny umbrellas.” 

The impression is, unfortunately, uncanny, if a bit high pitched. Aziraphale bites the inside of his cheeks and fights against the corners of his mouth, lifting up without his permission. “I do not talk like that.” 

“Yeah, and you don’t like frilly pink cocktails.” Crowley grins. “Mr. I only drink Sherry in the pub.” 

“I hate Talisker,” Aziraphale says snippily. “And it was embarrassing enough when you called me Miss Marple in front of the whole pub, thank you.”

Crowley makes a sound halfway between a snort and a chuckle, clearly pleased with himself. As if that wasn’t the entire reason they didn’t go to the pub anymore after that. As Aziraphale huffs, Crowley toes off his boots and lays back down on the settee, feet up on the armrest and heads pillowed on his crossed arms. 

It’s one of those days then. On days like this, when Crowley relaxes and makes himself at home, they spend the rest of the afternoon together, more often than not venturing outside after sundown to find something to eat and, on Aziraphale’s favourite days, Crowley will stay for the night, falling asleep on his spot after the obligatory nightcap, and the next morning they’ll stop for a pastry at Aziraphale’s favourite bakery around the corner, before parting to go back to real life. 

They haven’t had a day like this in so long, now that he thinks about it. Aziraphale misses it. He always misses Crowley, but after the day he’s had, he finds himself vibrating with hopefulness. “Comfortable?” 

Crowley frowns and gapes like a fish, which in his vast world of non-verbal clues means yes. “As I was saying, it could be fun, y’know?” 

Aziraphale raises an eyebrow at the non sequitur. “What?” 

“Using your brother’s money to enjoy yourself in paradise.” Crowley clicks his tongue. “Seems like the sort of thing you’d like.” 

Well. It is, it’s the thing. When he first got the parcel that morning, that was the half form planned in his mind: a ten day long extravaganza of his own, made of the most elaborate cocktails and fruit plates he could come up with, the fanciest bottle of wines and the most expensive massages the resort offered, gently provided by dearest Gabriel. It would have been fun, if it wasn’t for that damnable piece of paper accompanying the invite. 

Big enough for two people!!! Bring the man!!! Aziraphale sighs. “Well, not this time, I’m afraid.”

Crowley’s face does that whole scrunchy thing it does when he wants to ask more but refrains himself. “Why?” 

There’s the thing with Crowley Aziraphale finds most charming. Well, besides the underlying shyness and the poorly hidden nerdiness and the long, lean lines of his figure and his honey brown eyes and his slightly crooked nose - where was he? Ah, right. He’s always found Crowley’s inquisitiveness most charming. Today, he could do with a lot less questions. “Because, Crowley. Just because.” 

Crowley rolls his eyes. “No need to get all snippy. I asked you a question, because I know you and you love a good all inclusive retreat. I mean, I get not wanting to interact with your shitty family, but you’re pretty good at ignoring your problems usually, just look at the state of these shelves -” 

“Crowley.” Aziraphale cuts him off. “I’m going to make some tea.” He doesn’t wait for a reply, just gets up and trots to the little kitchenette where he keeps a kettle and some mugs. He’s very, very English, alright? 

And it’s not like he can tell Crowley he doesn’t want to go because he’s embarrassed about the fact that his homophobic brother managed to find the right partner before him. First of all, it’s a terrible thing to think; second of all, it gets more humiliating with every second he spends thinking about it, so he busies himself with his tea-making. 

That is, of course, until he sees a dark, looming presence in the corner of his eyes. Aziraphale sighs. “Fancy a cuppa?” 

“I’m sorry,” Crowley replies. “Now drop the frowny face, please?” 

Aziraphale’s frown deepens. “I’m making you a cup of tea.”

“I was just curious,” Crowley continues, unperturbed by Aziraphale’s rather aggressive tea making. “You know how I am with questions, don’t you? I wasn’t - it’s an interesting thing that happened to you and I didn’t think you’d get all pouty so fast.”

“I’m not pouty -” Aziraphale makes the mistake of looking up and into Crowley’s eyes. 

Blimey. He’s doing the thing. Aziraphale is a hundred percent sure Crowley doesn’t know he does that thing, but when he gets worried or sad or upset about something his eyes get wider and he sinks his canine into his bottom lip and his cheekbones tinge the slightest bit pink. Add the messy hair and the dishevelled look of his formerly pristine button up to the ensemble, and Aziraphale is doomed. His mouth is open before he even gets the chance to debate against himself. “They booked me a private bungalow.” The kettle starts whistling. “For me and my plus one.”

Crowley leans with his back against the small counter, arms crossed and the rest of him very still. “Right.” 

Aziraphale splashes his cup of tea with one teaspoon of milk. “I don’t have a plus one.”

Crowley uncrosses his arms and exhales. “Well then - I mean not well, but then-” 

“And I would rather spare myself the humiliation of going to Gabriel’s wedding alone and proving him right in the process.” His throat is dryer than it was before and now he’s put way too much milk in his tea. He will not cry over his brother. He can convince his eyes not to sting, if he tries hard enough. 

Suddenly, Crowley’s hands are in his field of vision and they hover around his own, shaky ones for a moment before - before snatching the cup of tea and pouring it in the sink. 

Aziraphale stares at the beige stain at the bottom of the sink being slowly washed away by a feeble trickle of water. 

“You put too much milk in that.” Crowley says. “You only like your tea with the tiniest splash of milk.”

Aziraphale blinks once and looks up to stare at Crowley instead, who simply nudges him away with his shoulder. “Go and sit down. I’ll bring you your tea.” 

“I-” Aziraphale opens and closes his mouth. This has been such a weird day. “Alright.” 

Crowley takes just a few minutes before coming out with a perfectly made cup of tea. Aziraphale doesn’t even need to taste it to be sure of it - he even put in Aziraphale’s favourite mug, the white one with little wings. He shoots Crowley a grateful smile. 

Crowley plops down on the settee, sitting down almost properly this time. “I could tell you that you have nothing to be ashamed of and that you’re an idiot for even thinking about the word humiliation, but -” He lifts his pointer finger and wiggles in the air a bit, ignoring Aziraphale’s half formed protest. “I’m not going to. You’re a stubborn little shit when you want to be, which is actually all the time.”

“Why thank you.” Aziraphale deadpans. “Anything else?”

Crowley breathes. “I have an idea.” He starts smiling before finishing the sentence. “You won’t like it.” 

Aziraphale stops and thinks about a time when he liked one of Crowley’s ideas. 

There was the time he convinced Aziraphale to scam a rare manuscripts dealer to obtain a first edition of Frankenstein. It was horribly nerve wracking and he’d been plagued by guilt-fueled nightmares for weeks before and after, but the manuscript now occupies the place of honour in his private library. 

Or the time when Crowley dragged Aziraphale to a new posh restaurant in Mayfair, which promised modern twists on evergreen classics and fascinating new techniques. It was horrible: the amuse-bouche ended up being a single leaf of lettuce and the wine was actually deconstructed, and he got so mad while Crowley kept laughing they ended up getting drunk on the weirdly shaped grapes and later falling asleep in the backroom mid-argument. 

There was also the time when Crowley had the brilliant idea of going on a seaside trip in the middle of February. It was cold and damp and the wind was almost strong enough to knock them off their feet, but it was… also strangely lovely. He remembers how red Crowley’s hair looked in the grey-white light, how he ended up wrapping his scarf around his friend’s quivering shoulder muttering something about weather appropriate clothing. It was… a nice day. 

Aziraphale hates most of Crowley’s ideas on the spot. In the end though, not all of them are that bad. So he squares his shoulder and says: “Tell me about it.” 

Crowley is visibly excited. He’s trying to tone it down, but Aziraphale can see he’s fairly vibrating. “Take me as your plus one.” 

Aziraphale has heard Crowley say many things, some more insane than others. This - this may take the cake. “I beg your pardon?”

“No, no, listen to me. It makes sense,” Crowley marches on. “I can be very annoying. I assure you I can be the most annoying person in the world, I can spend the entire ten days glueing coins to the ground or hacking into your brother’s phone to get it to blast Silent Night at three in the morning on the dot.” 

Aziraphale does not question whether Crowley would actually be able to hack into another person’s telephone. “Crowley-”

“Just - just think about it: you wouldn’t be alone, I would get to be mean to an arsehole, we spend ten days enjoying ourselves on a beach, all paid for by said arsehole.” He finishes with another devastating grin. “As long as we skip zumba no matter what.”

Aziraphale stares until his eyes start stinging and he has to blink. Then, he downs the rest of his tea in one, long gulp. “I don’t believe I can bring a friend as a plus one.” 

Crowley’s smile dims a bit. “Well, as long as you think you can stand holding my hand or something, we could -”

“Pretend?” Aziraphale tries to modulate his voice to something less squeaky. It fails. “You - you think it would be less humiliating for me to ask my best friend to pretend to be my boyfriend?” 

Crowley is properly frowning now. “You did not ask, I did - and it’s not like - I mean, it’s just a bit of fun.” 

“A bit of fun.” Aziraphale echoes. He rubs tired fingers into his temples. This has been such a weird, weird day. “How could you even - who would even believe it?” 

Crowley goes still. Aziraphale has - somehow - said something horribly wrong. “Right.” He says. He puts the glasses back on. “It was just - nevermind.” 

“No, Crowley, don’t be dramatic.” Aziraphale says, a touch pleadingly. “I merely - I don’t understand. What would you even gain out of it?” 

It’s the wrong thing. Again. Crowley puts on his previously discarded boots with a scoff. 

They were supposed to spend the day together, and now Aziraphale has said something wrong, and he hates both saying something wrong and not knowing what it is, and he’s truly having a really bad day. “Would you stop -”

Aziraphale’s landline in the other room cuts the air with a loud, obnoxious trill. When it rains it pours, and Aziraphale would very much like another private scream. 

“You should get that,” Crowley says, buttoning his coat back up. “I’ll just - see myself out.”

Aziraphale resists the urge to groan out loud. Crowley has a penchant for the dramatics, after all. But he has a hunch that rolling his eyes right now would be very, very counterproductive. 

Not to mention he has to focus all of his will power into not marching to the other room and smash the landline. “Stop. You don’t have to go anywhere.”

Crowley tilts his head in the direction of the trilling. “Don’t you have to -”

“He’ll call back.” There are exactly two people in the whole world who call him on this number. One is in the room with him right now, the other one has rented an island for zumba. “Sit down and give me five minutes and don’t you dare leave.” He sighs then, as Crowley keeps on frowning. “Please.” 

Crowley frowns and lets his eyebrows do a very complicated dance before settling back down on the settee. “You’re very annoying.”

Blessedly, the phone stops ringing. Knowing Gabriel, Aziraphale has a minute of reprise before it starts trilling again. He allows himself one second to bury his face in his hands, unfortunately not for a scream. “And you’re very dramatic.”

“Forgive me Mr. Fell if I wanted to - oh, nevermind. I don’t even know why I’m sitting there.” Coat still buttoned up, Crowley crosses his arms and scoffs, shaking his head to add to the dramatic ensemble. He somehow looks like an Italian greyhound wearing an oversized sweater, and Aziraphale has to bite his cheek not to smile. 

“Well, I don’t know why you’re sitting there either.” Aziraphale gives him a once over. “You could at the very least unbutton your coat.” 

Crowley just coils his arms tighter around himself. “Just because you’re naked today doesn’t mean I have to unbutton anything.”

This time, Aziraphale does roll his eyes. “You’re ridiculous.” 

“You’re ridiculous!” As far as comebacks go, this is not Crowley’s best. 

“Why are we even fighting?”

“Because apparently we can’t do anything fun!” 

Aziraphale throws his hands up. “Are you seriously mad at me because I do not want to have you be my fake plus one at my brother’s wedding?”

“I’m mad because you think I had to gain something to -” 

The phone starts ringing again, and they both groan at the same time. Aziraphale doesn’t even have the time to enjoy this return to unity before Crowley’s glare hits him in full force. “Either you answer it in the next thirty seconds or I will smash it. You know I will.” 

Aziraphale doesn’t move from his spot. He’s still holding the tea cup with a white knuckle grip. He stares at Crowley and thinks and lets the phone ring. “We’re friends,” he says eventually, for no particular reason. 

There’s a tension in Crowley’s jaw, Aziraphale worries about his poor teeth. “Yes, you idiot. That’s the reason I’m mad. I - I have nothing to gain. You’re my friend.” 

Aziraphale supposes he’s starting to understand. Crowley is a good friend, you see. Always supporting and overwhelmingly nice, even if it is in that weird way of his. Sometimes, Aziraphale is kind of concerned about Crowley’s timing: whenever he’s having a bad week, he knows he’ll see Crowley showing up before long, with a distraction or a gift or a lunch invitation or whatever it is he’d come up with that day. It’s almost like Crowley can sense certain things or something. 

He never asked for anything in return. Not that he had to, as their friendship is not transactional, never has been, really. 

Oh, well. Aziraphale supposes he gets it now.

“I didn't mean it like that,” Aziraphale mumbles. “You know I didn’t mean it like that.” 

The phone stops ringing. Crowley lets out a long exhale. “Well, evidently I didn’t know.” 

“There is no need to get snarky.” Aziraphale finally puts the cup down and wiggles his fingers in Crowley’s direction. “And take off the bloody coat.” 

“No need to get snarky, he says.” Crowley unbuttons the coat slow enough to annoy Aziraphale. “I’m only doing this because you hate the planet and crank up the heat like it’s -”

The phone starts ringing again. Crowley stops working on his buttons and shoots up. 

Aziraphale doesn’t know whether he’d prefer Crowley smashing the phone or actually picking it up, so he just follows him with quick little steps. 

As soon as Crowley’s right hand is close enough to the handset, he kicks him very lightly in the back of his knees. Very, very lightly; a barely there kick, really. Crowley is just such an actor. 

He gets to the phone first. With a sigh, he picks it up. “Hello, Aziraphale Fell speaking. I’m afraid we’re definitely quite -”

“Baby brother!” 

Aziraphale winces. Why must Gabriel be so obnoxiously loud all the time? He glances sideways at Crowley who’s still hopping on one foot, muttering something that sounds suspiciously like little shit. He sighs again. “Gabriel. Hello.”

“Hello? Hello? Do I just get a hello?” Gabriel laughs, for whatever reason. Aziraphale mouths a stop that in Crowley’s direction, who just glares at him and keeps rubbing his knee. Seriously, so dramatic. “I am so happy to hear your voice, baby brother. How are you? How are things going? Is the business still flourishing?” 

He will not subject himself to small talk with his brother, who absolutely does not care about his bookshop, who probably doesn’t even know what kind of books he even sells. It never made a difference to him, anyway. “I received the parcel this morning.” Aziraphale says simply. “Congratulations.” 

“Oh, I know! That’s why I called you! Rory downloaded this little app on my phone so that I could track the letter!” Gabriel giggles again. “I watched the little blue man coming closer and closer to you until it -”

“Delightful.” Aziraphale exhales. “Again, congratulations to you both. I’m happy for you.”

Crowley, who has finally stopped bouncing on one leg and throwing expletives at Aziraphale, hops onto Aziraphale’s desk and mouths, “Liar.”  

“Hush,” Aziraphale mouths back. In his ear, Gabriel is gushing about soulmates and twin flames and whatever. Crowley leans forward to eavesdrop and gags at the mention of cosmic bonding rituals. 

“So!” Aziraphale can hear the clapping hands. He shudders. “Have you already booked your flight? Do you need help with that? Me and Rory can easily provide for it, in case-”

“That won’t be necessary.” Good Lord. “I can perfectly provide for myself.” 

Gabriel just tuts. Aziraphale can just see it in his head: the head tilt, the pout, the furrowed brows, and suppress another shudder. He can feel Gabriel’s eyes burning a hole in his head even miles away. Everyone always said they looked nothing alike, save for their eyes, the same deep shade of blue. Aziraphale has never seen it. “Now, Aziraphale, baby brother, there’s no need to escalate. I want to keep our interactions peaceful and enriching.” 

Crowley’s mouth hangs open. “What the hell?”

Aziraphale raises a pointed eyebrow. He knows. “So, did you need anything else from this call?” 

“Well!” There’s some more clapping, and some giggling in the background. “I have an ongoing bet with this little devil on my shoulder…” 

Aziraphale physically shuts his eyes and removes the phone from his ear. “Hang up,” Crowley whisper-shouts, “I am begging you, put an end to my suffering.” 

“So, no Rory-cakes, not now,” there’s some more giggling and some unidentified sounds. Aziraphale puts a hand on his forehead, Crowley mumbles an incredulous Rory-cakes. At least he has a witness to all this madness.

He feels his face soften as he glances at his still glaring, still sulking, still overdramatic lovely friend. He can even feel it in his voice as he urges Gabriel to get to the point already (without escalating, of course. God forbid things escalate). 

“So, uhm, you read how we booked you the couple's bungalow?”

Ah, great. Now it’s a couple’s bungalow. Aziraphale’s hold on the receiver tightens. “Yes. Lovely thought.” 

“Yes! Rory was just telling me it may have been a bit too forward of me, you know, I may have put you on the spot,” more giggling in the background. “But! But I know my baby brother, and he never tells me anything! I just bet you’re hiding someone, I mean, how could you not? Look at you! Well, I can’t look at you right now, but I meant -”

“Gabriel.” Aziraphale breathes. “I get it.” 

In his own sick and twisted way, Gabriel is trying. He calls Aziraphale every week, tells him all about himself and his new job and his new life and asks him actual questions, compliments him, pretends to know anything about book selling. He thinks he’s trying to… patch things up.

He’s never once apologised. Not once in all of these weekly phone calls. After a year, Aziraphale is pretty sure Gabriel doesn’t even know what his favourite book is. 

“So, uh, what’s his name? We’ll need to add him to the official guest list. Exclusive and all, you know how it is..” 

Aziraphale sinks his teeth in his bottom lip and lowers the receiver for a moment. In front of him, Crowley is looking at him expectantly, almost pained. 

His idea is - is madness. It’s ridiculous, embarrassing, humiliating, something so cliché not even the silly movies Crowley makes him watch use it as a trope. He shouldn’t even entertain it. He should reiterate how insane it is, and let Crowley sulk however long he sees fit. 

“You seriously want to go through that alone?” Crowley mumbles. “And not annoy them in the slightest? Seriously? Rory-cakes?” 

Aziraphale stalls. “Why do you want to subject yourself to this?” 

The old tea kettle in the back room has nothing on the sound Crowley makes. “Are you being dense on purpose?” Still perched on the desk, he extends one long leg to kick Aziraphale’s thigh, which, he supposes, is fair enough. “You’re my best friend. I won’t leave you on your own.” 

Aziraphale exhales, bites back a smile. There’s a voice still coming out of the phone. “Azi? You still there?” One year of calls, and Gabriel still doesn’t know Aziraphale despises that nickname.

Crowley is such a good friend. He’s always been the best of the two of them: the one with the gifts, the one calling, the one coming over. He deserves a better friend, Aziraphale has always thought so. 

“I am,” he replies to Gabriel. He looks at Crowley, and then sighs. There is truly only one person in the world who could get him to get along with the most insane of things just with a crooked smile - or grimace, in this case. 

Of course, Aziraphale had to fancy him. 

“It’s Anthony Crowley. Put that name on the reservation.” 

Gabriel lets him pick up after a few minutes of squeals and exclamation points he can actually hear in his voice. At least he manages to free himself before Rory can say hi!!!

“So,” Crowley says, feet swinging. “Jesus Christ.” 

Aziraphale keeps massaging his temples. “He’s awful. Well, I guess he’s trying but -”

“Still awful.”

“Yes.” Perhaps Aziraphale is being too harsh, or perhaps four decades of bullying are a bit hard to forget, despite the namaste and love Gabriel preaches now. 

“Well. Should we open the Barolo?” 

Of course Crowley knows about Aziraphale’s red wines collection. “We might as well.” 

So they end up back where this whole madness started. In the backroom, Crowley half lying down on the settee, Aziraphale burrowed into his armchair, glass in hand. This time at least he’s savouring it. 

Crowley is on a rant Aziraphale has tuned out for the most part. Something about names, perhaps? Something about what kind of name is Rory anyway? Short for what? Robert? Robin? What? Aziraphale merely hums; he does not know what Rory is short for and, speaking of names, his is Aziraphale - he will never comment on anyone else’s name.

Still, Crowley is ranting and moaning and the sound is actually kind of comforting. Aziraphale tunes the words out but basks for a while in the familiarity of his friend’s voice, forgetting about the whirlwind of thoughts currently plaguing him. 

It lasts, approximately, five minutes. 

“Gabriel is forty six.” Aziraphale says. “Which means he is one year older than me. Technically, only ten months, our parents got exceptionally busy that singular year they were married.”
Crowley tilts his head and blinks. He discarded the glasses and the shoes, much to Aziraphale’s quiet relief. “Alright?”

“You’ll need to know these details if we’re to pull this off.” Aziraphale refills his own glass. “Now, as for the rest of my family, I am pretty sure he invited most of our cousins. There’s Michael and Sandy, who I strongly advise you stay away from, then there’s Muriel, who’s probably adopted and actually really nice, and I do hope Sarah doesn’t show up because -”

“Uh, actually, uh, time out?” Crowley tries to mime the time out gesture, missing it completely. “Not the family tree when we’re two bottles deep, eh?”

Aziraphale hums noncommittally. “I suppose I could write it all down for you. Yes, I should actually, so that you don’t forget any details.” He traces the rim of the glass with his fingertips. “Should I also add facts about me?” 

“I know facts about you.” Crowley replies. “What? It’s not like we don’t know each other.”

“We have to fool an entire wedding party, Crowley.” Aziraphale quips. “You need to learn the right things.” 

“The right things.” Crowley echoes, raising an eyebrow. “You tell people your favourite colour is yellow but it’s actually the deep burgundy you painted the two columns outside. You take your tea with one splash of milk, no sugar when you’re home, but you add two tablespoons of sugar whenever you take it someplace else. You eat sandwiches with cutlery and you own multiple handkerchiefs with your initials on it. You  -” Crowley cuts himself off mid sentence with a wave of his hand. “I know things about you, what the hell. It’s been a decade.” 

Aziraphale has always considered Crowley a collector. He finds things, he collects them, then he gives them away to those who ask. But he remembers every single detail about the things he finds: he would burst into the bookshop at random times asking Aziraphale to take a drive with him to the particular location he found an old world map once because he remembered a nice tea shop near it; he would recall the name of the children of the old lady who sold him a Byron first edition and secretly send her a card every Christmas; he would never show up on Aziraphale’s birthday but always, always managed to make him found a little gift on his doorstep, year after year, without him ever having to tell him something about it.
Crowley collects things, and memories, and sometimes people. Aziraphale had never stopped to think about all the things he collected about him, during the years. So he sits in his armchair and stares, and stares, and stares, while he thinks about how no one ever knew about burgundy or two tablespoons of sugar because no one ever asked, but no one ever saw either. 

No one until Crowley. 

“You’re right, I think.” Aziraphale blurts out. “I - This is a sober kind of conversation.” And Aziraphale does not have any more fight in him, today. He cannot stop and think about all the things Crowley means to him right now, not after today. It’s an issue for future Aziraphale (and for every Aziraphale from ten years ago up until today, but whatever). Present Aziraphale is feeling a bit hungry. “Should we find something to nibble on?” 

Crowley blinks at him twice before shrugging. “Eh, why not. Just don’t ask me to move.”  

“I’ll go get the takeaway menus,” Aziraphale brushes his knees and gets up, giving his wobbly legs a moment. “And don’t you dare say a word about my takeaway menus.” 

“I’m just saying you could simply look it up on your phone if you were a normal person.” 

There. The familiarity of a well-practiced argument. This is what Aziraphale needs right now. 

When he comes back to the room, he finds Crowley sitting up, phone in hand and brows furrowed. “Do you trust my menus so little?” 

Crowley looks up. “Uh? No, I just booked our flights.” 

The menus drop to the floor with a dull thud. “What?”

“What?” Crowley tilts his head. “I had a discount given my air miles. I don’t trust that dinosaur you call a computer with my tickets, thank you very much, or the agencies you insist on going to like it’s 1987 or something.” 

“But,” Aziraphale starts, nails digging into his palms. 

“You have the window seat.” Crowley continues, clearly unbothered. “Thank me later. Now, I’m looking into the last bit, you know the one with the little death trap called a seaplane, and I need the name of the atoll - are you alright?” 

Aziraphale is clearly not, standing in the middle of his backroom with balled fists and flared nostrils. “I am perfectly capable of handling my own transportation.” 

Crowley blinks. “Jesus. Big words? Are you big words mad right now?” 

“I do not - Crowley!” He gives up, arms flailing around. “You’re very good at this fake boyfriend thing. Already patronizing me.” With a huff, he leans down to pick up the discarded menus, ignoring Crowley’s spluttering.

“Patronizing - what are you talking about?” 

“Oh, poor Aziraphale, there is no way he can book his own flight, I certainly have to do it for him!” The dumplings offer from the Chinese place down the street crumbles in his hands. “Poor Aziraphale, it’s not like he operates a business on his own, does his taxes on his own, has lived on his own for half of his life - he’s certainly not able to handle an airline website!” The Italian Delights suffer the same fate. 

Somehow, Crowley is now kneeling down in front of him, wrestling the Italian Delights out of his hands. “I wasn’t - oh, come on! I was doing you a favour!” 

“See! You also have the gaslighting down to a science!” 

“I - you - I didn’t even know you knew the word gaslighting.”

“Oh, seriously?” With a firmer thug, he snatches the damn menu out of Crowley’s grasp for good. “I am so glad you think so highly of my intellect.”

“Stop victimizing the Italian Delights. I was in the mood for some -”

“Crowley!”

“Fine!” Crowley throws his hands up in defeat. “I apologise for being a travel freak who needs to have tickets in his Apple Wallet one month in advance! Oh, will I patronize you if I ask whether you know what an Apple Wallet is?”  

Aziraphale exhales and hides his face in his hands, certainly not because he won’t admit he has no idea about what an Apple Wallet is. There’s a hand somewhere around his shoulder. “I’m not your brother, Aziraphale. I guess I should have asked you before -”

Aziraphale looks up. “You guess?” 

“Shut up.” Crowley says, a corner of his mouth already twitching. “I didn’t mean to patronize you. Who do you think I am?” 

Aziraphale stares at Crowley for a while. The way those brown eyes shine is honestly unfair. “I do not know what an Apple Wallet is.” 

Crowley snorts, then gets up, offering a hand. “Let’s just eat.”

Aziraphale takes the offered hand. “I will refund you.” He lifts two fingers as soon as Crowley opens his mouth. “This is non negotiable, Anthony.” 

“Well, damn.” The Anthony in question whistles. “Can I at least buy dinner?” 

He probably feels worse about the whole incident than he’s letting on. Aziraphale never calls him by his first name and he certainly never accused him of gaslighting before, either. And the way Crowley’s brows are still twitching and the hand he offered Aziraphale is still squeezing tells him he definitely feels he needs to overcompensate. I’m not your brother. Aziraphale tries for a smile. “Alright, then. Dessert included, travel freak.” 

Dinner comes shortly after - one perk of living and working in Soho, London. Good food and good delivery services are just around the corner. Aziraphale enjoys his linguine and for the first time in this awful day he allows himself to relax, enjoying a story about Crowley’s pet fish, Lola, who he is immensely fond of, and enjoying a change of topic most of all. 

Well, not really. He really is immensely fond of Lola - which is probably a silly thing to be so fond of, but Aziraphale has been enamored of the Betta Fish ever since he first laid eyes on the purple blue scales and the flowy fins, the first time he visited Crowley’s place and spent the better part of fifteen minutes just watching her float in her tank. Such a mesmerizing creature. 

“Oh!” He gasps. “What will she do when you’re away?”

“Float.” Crowley replies around a mouthful of aubergines. Aziraphale smacks him in the chest. “She has her special tank which gives her food every six hours. And I pay an employee of a fancy pet shop to come and change the water and clean the filter when I’m away.” 

“Oh.” Aziraphale breathes. He never once asked himself about Lola and her whereabouts on Crowley’s business trips. Why is he such a terrible friend and why is he only realising it today? “You could have asked me. I would have been happy to provide for Miss Lola.” 

Crowley glances at him, taking another bite of his parmigiana before replying. “You. Happy to clean out shitty fish water.”

It’s not like that would be Aziraphale’s dream job, but, “I love Lola.” 

“Want to see her?” Crowley picks up his phone again, beckoning Aziraphale to move closer. “Her fancy tank has a camera on it - wait a second.” 

Aziraphale smiles as a blurry image of a fish tank appears on the little screen. In the far right corner, a little purple-bluish blur floats happily. He traces it with a finger, leaning more into Crowley’s space. “Hello there, little lady.” 

“You truly like the fish.”

Aziraphale looks up, finding Crowley already looking at him. It’s the golden hue of the many lamps inside the shop, it’s the lingering smell of good food still in the air, it’s the silence between them - but the moment feels so soft. Warm. Special. 

Aziraphale lowers his gaze back to Crowley’s phone. “I was very mad today.”

“I know. I could tell.” 

A testament to a truly draining, truly awful, truly weird day, Aziraphale sighs and rests his head on Crowley’s shoulder, who tenses for a second before relaxing again. 

They don’t do this very often. They’ve probably hugged twice in their whole acquaintance, and Aziraphale has never found it in himself to be more open to casual, free touches, never brave enough to voice his actual wishes. A legacy from the way he grew up, and a proof of how well he knows himself and how greedy he can be. 

Today, though, today he is too tired to care. He just needs a friend. “It’s going to be fine. We’re going to be so annoying.”

Aziraphale huffs a laugh. “I cannot believe you talked me into this.” 

Crowley hums. “Zumba.” 

“Arts and crafts.” 

“Karaoke.” He feels Crowley’s shoulder vibrate under his temple. “Seriously, are you sure this is not an elaborate ploy to murder you?”

“I’m not, actually.” He’s actually entertained the thought, as he was analyzing the glittery Roriel Fest earlier. “At least the location would be nice.” 

“Nothing like getting slaughtered on a zumba dancefloor.” 

“You don’t need a dance floor for zumba.” Aziraphale chuckles. “Why are you so obsessed with zumba?” 

“Long story,” Crowley replies. “You don’t want to know. Trust me.” 

Aziraphale does. Damn him, he does. 

He’s trusted Crowley since their very first conversation. Fussy, annoying creature of habit Aziraphale Fell trusted a stranger dressed with skinny jeans, of all things, ever since they spoke for the first time. There is no one else on the planet who could have talked him into this kind of madness. 

“Aziraphale?” 

He blinks. “Yes?”

“Is your passport up to date? I could look into checking in early -”

“Oh, good Lord Anthony.” 

“Passport?”

“It’s in the inside pocket of my jacket.”

“You should put it somewhere safer.”

Aziraphale sighs. Crowley was not kidding about being a travel freak.

In the past month, they’ve been to clothing stores, because Crowley was sure Aziraphale’s summer wardrobe wasn’t suitable (he was right), suitcases stores, because Crowley didn’t deemed Aziraphale’s usual luggage acceptable (he was, once again, right) and to more lunches and dinners they’ve ever been to, to get their story straight. 

Aziraphale hasn’t stopped to think about how twisted it is to see his favourite person so often just so they can successfully fool his entire extended family into thinking they’re a real couple. If he does, he’ll have to excuse himself and enjoy a number of private screams. 

“It’s fine, dear. Everything is ready, you know it is. Nothing has changed in the past thirty minutes.” 

Crowley stops fiddling with his duffle bag. “Can I please -”

“Sweet Jesus.” Aziraphale reaches into his jacket and hands him his passport. “Relax, Crowley.” 

“Aw, look at you playing the boyfriend perfectly. Already telling me I should just relax.” 

“I don’t like you.” Aziraphale bites back a smile. “Now, onto more important things.” 

Crowley cuts him off with a lifted finger. “We keep our first meeting the same, old books galore, blah blah. Then somewhere along the line in the past year we started going out, vavoom, love aplenty. Stay away from the bald cousin, interact with Muriel, try to figure out what the hell Rory stands for, do not get sunburnt.” 

Aziraphale blinks. He gets an unscratchable itch every time they go over their makeshift love story. “I was actually about to tell you I was going to look at Lola for a while.” 

Crowley raises an eyebrow. “Be my guest.” 

They’re staying at Crowley’s place for the night, since it’s closer to the airport and he’s the only one of them who owns a car. Aziraphale has successfully avoided panicking in the past month, losing himself in preparations and packing and the all hubbub of owning a shop in London in December.

Now, the suitcases are packed and stashed in Crowley’s living room, the guest room is made for him, and the panic is ebbing just below Aziraphale’s skin. 

He’s doing this. He’s actually doing this. He’s spending ten days in the Maldives with Anthony Crowley as his fake plus one to his brother’s wedding. 

Lola floats in her fancy tank, a whirlwind of purple scales. Aziraphale stares and wishes he could take her place, just floating around without a thought in the world until New Year’s. He would make a good fish, actually. He taps on the glass three times, grinning as Lola comes his way in a swirl of fins. She’s truly so pretty. 

Aziraphale never considered himself partial to pet fish or any other pets, but something about Lola hypnotizes him. Perhaps he is so fond of her because he is very fond of her owner. 

Which is - which is such an embarrassing thought -

“Hey.”

Aziraphale doesn’t jump. That would be ridiculous. He just lost himself there, for a moment. “Yes?” 

Crowley looks at him funnily for a moment. Aziraphale steps away from the tank with a light flush. “You’re a nerd.” 

“Yes, well. Do you have something new to tell me?”

Crowley tries to hide his snort with a cough, only earning an eye roll. “We’re leaving at three thirty in the morning, so I’m going to sleep now.” 

Aziraphale glances at his watch. It’s five past eight. “You can… sleep now?” 

“Eh. I’ll close my eyes and it’ll just come.” Crowley just shrugs. Aziraphale has always been envious of people who could just - sleep. 

“I’ll - will it bother you if I stay up for a bit?” 

“It will bother me if you can’t get up on time.”

Aziraphale stares. There is truly no one else who can build up his annoyance quite like Crowley. “I have insomnia. I will be up before you.”

In the many years of knowing each other, Aziraphale has catalogued a fair share of Crowley’s throaty, non verbal responses. This is a new one. “Since when?”

“Since I was a child?” 

“Why didn’t I know it?” Crowley’s frown just deepens. “Every time I stayed over-”

“I slept very little, yes. You just didn’t notice.” Aziraphale huffs. “It’s alright, really. I will just relax and wait for you to call me.” 

Crowley wants to say something more, Aziraphale can see it. In the end, he decides against it for some reason. “Fine,” he says flatly. He lifts two thumbs. “I’ll just -” 

Aziraphale gives him a small smile. “Good night.” 

Crowley mumbles something before disappearing down the hallway. Aziraphale turns back to whisper a goodnight to Lola before settling on the sofa, surrounded by their suitcases, and picking up one of the books he packed for entertainment. 

He barely makes it ten pages into The Secret Garden before losing what little focus he had to begin with. It’s just the damn suitcases’ fault for staring at him and reminding him of what he’s about to do. 

He doesn’t want to see his family again. He doesn’t want to hear Gabriel’s loud voice in person and to properly meet namaste and love Rory, he doesn’t want to interact with his cousins and to subject himself to their… looks. There’s a reason he stopped visiting home for Christmas, and it wasn’t because of Gabriel’s less than concealed homophobia or his mother’s death. 

They always looked at him like he was a stranger. And perhaps he was, he is, with his blonde hair nobody else in the family shares and his preference for neutrals and his love for books and a quiet life. He’s always been the different one, the black sheep: it bothered him once, when he still cared about them. Sometimes, it still bothers him; other times, he’s more bothered by how little he cares. It’s still family, after all. That must mean something, right?

He should be bothered by how much he’s dreading this trip. He should be bothered by how much he’s glad he’s not going through it alone, despite it being a farce, despite it being dangerous for his -

“Hey.” 

The book drops from his hands with a loud thud. “Oh, good Lord. You gave me a heart attack.”

Crowley sits down next to him on the sofa, changed into comfier clothes. Aziraphale ignores how the sight makes his chest tighten. “I can’t sleep knowing you’re awake now.” 

Aziraphale sighs. “I’m sorry? I thought you knew that.” 

“Well, I didn’t.” He lets his head fall on the back of the sofa, red hair spread everywhere. “Any other life shattering information I should know about?” 

Aziraphale turns to look at him properly. “I actually hate books. The shop is a cover up for my underground activities.” 

“I knew that already. The lady in the coffee shop in front of you thinks you’re a criminal.”

Aziraphale laughs quietly. “Go to sleep.” 

“I can’t. It’s too weird knowing you’re here, awake.” 

Aziraphale bends down to pick up his book. “I have entertainment.” 

Crowley leans further back and closes his eyes, arms crossed. Aziraphale raises an eyebrow before the request even passes Crowley’s lips, and starts reading chapter one from the beginning, out loud. 

It’s not a new arrangement. It started one night, back in the bookshop, when a rather intoxicated Crowley said Aziraphale had the kind of voice fit to narrate audiobooks. Aziraphale, who abhors audiobooks and everything that is not strictly words-on-paper, had laughed it off in the beginning, but after two more glasses he picked up his previously discarded book and just… started reading out loud. He enjoyed it. 

He still enjoys it. Words spoken aloud take a whole different meaning, a deeper connecting force. He likes how the sentences flow from his mouth, how his voice changes to modulate according to different characters and scenarios, and how the scenes come to life with his voice. He likes how Crowley relaxes when he reads out loud, how his face softens and betrays his enjoyment, how he always, always manages to fall asleep. 

He gets through three chapters before Crowley’s snores become too loud to be ignored. As always, he allows himself one minute of unashamed ogling and one single touch to the red strands he’s grown so used to long for. Then, he nudges Crowley’s shoulder, progressively harder until he gets a groan and an expletive in response. “Go to bed, Crowley.”

Crowley’s eyes stay closed. “Ugh. Shut up.”  

“Come on.” Aziraphale keeps poking him. “Before I carry you myself.” 

One brown eye blinks open. “Time is it?” 

“Ten to ten.” 

Another groan, louder, and Crowley finally starts to get up. He often looks like a skinny dog, tonight more than usual. Must be the casual wear. Crowley glares and wiggles two fingers in his direction. “I’ll meet you here at three fifteen. Don’t be late.” 

Aziraphale winces. He really didn’t think the travel freak thing was that serious. “I’ll be here. Literally.” 

“Don’t remind me.” Crowley walks over to his carry on bag, checking the documents for the fiftieth time this evening alone. Aziraphale refrains from commenting. Again. 

Once he deems the organisation acceptable (as if it could be any different from an hour prior, but whatever - Aziraphale has decided against commenting, after all), he claps his hands. “Right then. Night, angel.” 

For the second time, the book slips from Aziraphale’s hands and down on the floor. He normally takes exemplary care of his volumes, but. Even Crowley’s hands have frozen mid-clap, eyes wide. Aziraphale swallows. “What?” 

Crowley doesn’t blink for five long seconds. “Pet names.” He blurts out. 

Aziraphale keeps staring. “What?” 

“I thought we should have pet names. For each other. You know, as - as couples do.” Crowley lowers his hands and puts them on his hips. “So, you know, angel fits. With your curly little - erm.” 

It’s not, historically, the first time Aziraphale has been called ‘angel’. He is a very, very gay man with curly blond hair and light eyes who has been on his fair share of terrible first dates and men don’t have much imagination, let alone creativity. 

Still. He and Crowley don’t do pet names. They have never done pet names, certainly not - not that. So he just keeps staring. 

Crowley swallows and marches on. “Better to start early. You know, practicing and all. To be more natural. Erm.” 

Slowly, so slowly, Aziraphale nods. It does make sense. Couples do not call each other by their last names, after all. Still. Still. “Natural. Of course.” 

“Of course.” Crowley echoes. “So, uhm. Goodnight then.” 

If Aziraphale thought he couldn’t sleep before, now he’s sure. Still, he plasters on a smile. “Goodnight.” 

Crowley nods, trips on one of the suitcases, swears some more and mutters another hasty goodnight before retreating back to his room. 

Aziraphale waits until he hears his door shutting, then waits another two minutes, counting the entire one hundred and twenty seconds in his head, before picking up a throw pillow, mushing his face into it, and screaming. Very quietly, of course. 

He’s going to spend the next ten days with Anthony Crowley, which would be delightful, in any other circumstance.

He’s going to spend ten days with Anthony Crowley wearing little to no clothes, who now will call him angel, while they pretend to be romantically involved, at his awful brother’s wedding extravaganza, spending the nights in the couple's bungalow right next to said awful brother’s accommodation. 

Oh, and he also needs to survive a twelve hour intercontinental flight and an hour on a tiny, dangerous looking plane with a self proclaimed travel freak who is the same man he’s desperately infatuated with, and has been for ten years, while they practice how to make his entire family believe they’re together.

Ten days. Two hundred and forty hours. Fourteen thousands and four hundred minutes. 

Oh, he forgot. It’s also bloody Christmas. 

He burrows his face deeper into the pillow, and screams again.

Chapter Text

Somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean - 11 days before Christmas

Aziraphale lets his head fall back on the cushion of his seat. His neck pillow is making him sweaty, his compression socks are not compressing anything and on top of that, his skin feels so dry it’s about to snap. 

This is why he prefers trains. 

In the seat beside him, Crowley is obviously sleeping. He closed his eyes as soon as takeoff was completed and just fell asleep on the spot. He didn’t even need a pillow around his neck. 

Aziraphale tried to read a book, but got a headache an hour in. So he tried to watch a movie, but nothing in the catalogue was even remotely good enough. He tried the book again, but got distracted by the crying baby two rows behind. 

He is bored. Transcendentally, epically bored.

And well, Crowley had said it would be fine, in a throwaway comment just before dozing off. He actually asked Aziraphale to wake him if he got bored, probably knowing Aziraphale is too polite to even consider it. 

And he is, normally. The thought wouldn’t even cross his mind. But they are just fours hours in and he is so, so bored. 

He pokes Crowley in the shoulder. Nothing happens. He doesn’t even stir. Aziraphale sighs. 

He pokes him harder. Nothing. Not even a tiny frown on his brows. 

He grabs Crowley’s shoulder and shakes him. Finally, he blinks awake. Groggily, but surprisingly eloquent, he opens his mouth. “What? Are we landing?” 

Aziraphale exhales. “No, no we are not. It’s been a little over four hours.” 

Crowley raises an eyebrow. “Then why the hell - is there an emergency?” 

“I am bored.” Aziraphale replies. He is met with an unblinking stare that goes on for two beats too much. Then, Crowley exhales slowly, and leans back on his seat with a groan and his arms crossed. “Goodnight.” 

“Seriously?” Aziraphale doesn’t pout, because he never pouts and he is way too old to pout. “You told me to wake you if -”

“Well I didn’t think you’d actually do it!” 

“Fine.” Aziraphale turns to look out of the tiny window. “I’ll be bored alone then.” 

The silence afterwards does not surprise Aziraphale, but it also deeply annoys him. It stretches on for two minutes before he hears another, louder groan and a tap on his shoulder. “Alright, alright. I’m sorry. I’m awake.” 

Aziraphale bites his smiling lips and schools his features into a more neutral expression before turning around. “I do apologise. I truly am so bored.” 

“Yeah, well. You should sleep.” Crowley grumbles. “Have you tried any trick?”

Aziraphale rolls his eyes. Every trick ever invented by mankind regarding sleep has been tried and tried and tried once again, for good measure. Nothing ever worked. “I don’t know, Crowley. Has a chronic insomniac tried any trick to fall asleep? Should we ask the audience?” 

“Jesus, you’re even bitchier than this morning.” 

“I am not bitchy -”

Aziraphale cuts himself off. He supposes snapping at Crowley for the way he was holding a duffle bag and then half yelling at him because he may have suggested taking ten minutes to say goodbye to a fish were a tad excessive is, a little bit, bitchy. “In my defense, I had fallen asleep an hour prior.” 

He didn’t even make it to the guest room Crowley had provided for him. He just stayed there on the couch, enjoying some more private screams, some more sulking, some more chapters of his books and then finally, blessedly, some precious minutes of rest. Until Crowley had barged into his living room, shouting rise and shine. 

“And whose fault is that? Mine?” Crowley retorts. “Blaming me for your own nervous system shortcomings, you truly are the perfect boyfriend.”

Aziraphale matches Crowley’s saccharine, borderline manic smile. “Not as much as you are, darling.”

They lapse into silence for a few beats after. Crowley mumbles something under his breath and gets up to retrieve his bag from the overhead compartment, Aziraphale tries not to gawk at the newly revealed patch of skin when his soft henley rides a bit up his stomach. 

Eleven days, he thinks. Eleven days of this he’s supposed to survive. 

It gets even worse after that, because Crowley sits back down and offers Aziraphale his hand, palm up. “Chocolate rice cake?” 

Fine. Aziraphale is fine. Why wouldn’t he be? “Did you pack snacks?” 

“I’m travelling with you. Obviously I did.” He wiggles his hand. “So?”

Aziraphale just sighs and takes the offered packaging, tearing it open with a smile far wider than necessary. He’s smiling even as he bites into the rice cake, which is not his number one choice as far as snacks go, but Crowley packed it for him and it’s suddenly a rare delicacy.

His lovely, lovely friend. He is not going to survive this. 

“Thank you,” he says after his first bite. “Awfully nice of you.” 

“Shut it.” Crowley mumbles. Aziraphale just tries for a wink; the unbearable weight of being perceived as anything other than aloof and prickly. Every little insight into Crowley’s actual generous personality is a gift. 

Aziraphale shakes himself and takes another bite. Then, checking to see if Crowley’s fallen back asleep, he finds him staring back at him. He raises an eyebrow in a silent question.

“Tell me,” Crowley drawls, angling his whole body in Aziraphale’s direction, his long legs taking up the entire space in front of him, even in business class. “Tell me a you thing.” 

Crowley came up with the little game about a week after their… new arrangement. A way to get to know things about one another without it sounding like a job interview, Crowley had said - in way less words and a lot more weird sounds. As always, Aziraphale had been hesitant: if he had to rate the most unpleasant things in the world, talking about himself like that would rate first.

So he slightly manipulated the game to only collect little bits of information about Crowley he didn’t know before: how he went to uni for botany, of all things, but dropped out half into his second years after getting into an unspecified fight with the board of directors of his department; how he got Lola after a man he used to work with told him he would never be able to look after a pet, selfish as he was (now Aziraphale had been - and still is - doubtful about this man being merely a colleague, but Crowley had been sure); how he deconstructs every dish he eats, eating the green bits first and his favourite parts last. Four or five rounds of the unilateral game after, Crowley had picked up on Aziraphale’s little devious plan of never making it about himself, so he took it upon himself to always open the game with a question of his own. 

Aziraphale sighs and doesn’t even think about getting out of it. They had one too many fights about this already, so he just thinks. Finishing his snack, he finally decides. “When I was a child, I wanted to be a veterinarian.”

Crowley rolls his lips in. “No, a kid wanting to be a vet? Shocking.” 

Aziraphale smiles as he shakes his head, looking down at a crease in his trousers. This part is always easier if he’s not looking at Crowley. “I ran around the garden to spot all the little snails and worms and ladybugs, if I was lucky, even butterflies. I wanted to take care of them, not of dogs and cats, that would have been so cliché.” He remembers how…ridiculous he sounded like when he tried to explain his plan. Still, every time he now spots a slimy trail or a little red-and-black little bug in one of his walks, he smiles and watches for a while. Just a little while. 

“You… you wanted to be a… bug doctor?” 

There’s evident mirth in Crowley’s voice. It’s not disappointing, because it is a funny story. It’s not a crime to laugh at his childish antics. It’s not… it’s not personal. “Yes, well.” He crosses his arms. “I was a child who was taught to love all creatures, great and small, and took it literally.” 

Crowley makes one of his weird sounds, making Aziraphale look up. He finds Crowley looking back at him, face all pinched. “What?”

“Don’t make me say it,” he pleads. “I beg you, don’t make me say it.” 

Aziraphale just blinks. “What?” 

“Oh, god. A bug doctor. It’s… cute.” Crowley looks properly pained. “It’s very cute.” 

Aziraphale just stares. “I don’t think I have ever heard you say that word out loud.” 

Another weird sound. “I begged you.” 

For some reason, it makes Aziraphale laugh. Crowley is weird; he forgets sometimes, but behind the looks and the constructed charm he is just weird. And unfortunately, Aziraphale likes him way too much. “Well, your turn. Tell me a Crowley thing.” 

Crowley chews on nothing for a while. He’s wearing a new pair of glasses today, the ones with covers on the sides as well. They are Aziraphale’s least favourite pair of glasses Crowley owns, as he cannot steal even a peek of his eyes. He doesn’t like talking to his own reflection for long periods of time, but he knows how particular Crowley is with his accessories.

“I tell everyone I restored my car by myself, but it’s a lie.” 

Of all the things he expected - “Wait, the Bentley?” 

Crowley nods curtly. Aziraphale gasps. “Crowley! You told me you restored it yourself!”

“Well, I lied.” Crowley shrugs with that fake nonchalance Aziraphale knows so well. “It was a cool lie, alright? Everyone always looks impressed.”

“But you didn’t do anything.”

“I barely know where the engine is located.” 

For some reason, that does it for Aziraphale. Letting out a very inelegant snort he will later deny ever making, he starts giggling. Not laughing, not guffawing, properly and embarrassingly giggling.

“Alright, that’s enough.” Crowley swats him lightly on the arm, but his mouth is doing that upward tilt he does when he’s trying not to smile. “It’s seriously not that funny.” 

“I told so many people about it!” Aziraphale chokes out. “So many people in London think my friend fixed a classic car himself!”

Cheeks pink, Crowley swats Aziraphale again. “Who do you even talk to, beside me?” 

Perhaps so many people is a bit of an exaggeration. But there is a particularly annoying patreon of the shop that knows how Aziraphale’s dear, dear friend is a genius in mechanics and who shouldn’t bother him anymore with all of those talks about classic cars and their maintenance if he wants to have a chance at impressing him (he does not).

“I cannot believe you made it up.” Aziraphale wipes some tears under his eyes. “Why would you?” 

“Oh, shut up, bug doctor.” Crowley scowls, mouth still pinched. “It was a cool story.”

Shaking his head, Aziraphale leans forward to pat Crowley’s knee. “You are so very cool, dear. The coolest fake mechanic-”

Crowley smiles then, small and tight but real nonetheless. “Will you drop it?”

“I should have known.” Aziraphale gives Crowley a once over. The designer sunglasses, the artfully tousled red hair, the expensive looking angora henley that fits him like skin. When he looks back up, Crowley is biting his cheek to keep his smile small. “You do not look like someone who fixes cars.” 

“I contain multitudes, you absolute bast-”

“Gentlemen?” 

Aziraphale finds a sturdy looking steward leaning into his booth and looking at the both of them with a toothy smile, painfully fake and way too wide for comfort. “Yes?”

“We don’t need anything,” says Crowley, polite as ever. “Bye.”

The steward ignores him. “We are so glad you’re enjoying the flight, but could you perhaps keep your tone down so that the other passengers can enjoy it as well?” 

“No,” Crowley replies. “Bye.”

Aziraphale rolls his eyes. “I apologise, it’s my fault. You see, I was having trouble sleeping and -”

“Angel, stop.” Crowley puts a hand on Aziraphale’s shoulder, and he promptly forgets the rest of his sentence. He forgot about the pet name for a while there. His brain is, at least, trying to protect him. “As I said, bye.” 

“We’ll keep our voices down.” Aziraphale pats the hand on his shoulder and gives the steward what he hopes is an apologetic smile. “Won’t we, darling?” 

The man beams. It’s deeply unsettling. “Thank you, Mr?”

“Bye!” Both Aziraphale and the man jump at Crowley’s bark. With a final nod in Aziraphale’s direction, the poor steward leaves them alone. 

“Don’t be a nightmare. He’s just working.” Aziraphale keeps his voice purposefully close to a whisper. Crowley lowers his eyes just to glare at him. “Oh, I’m sure he is.”

The hand on his shoulder is a pleasant weight. As soon as he notices it, of course, Crowley drops it. Aziraphale’s eyes linger on it as it rests between their seats. 

Crowley yawns. “Think you can sleep now?” 

Aziraphale ponders it for a bit. He is, unfortunately, even less sleepy than before. All those giggles and those little touches have awakened him completely, and not even the looming headache creeping in behind his right eye is enough to convince his brain to let him rest. 

He sighs. “You can sleep, Crowley.” He picks up his previously discarded book and taps the cover twice. “Thank you for indulging me.” 

Crowley doesn’t seem pleased. He chews on his bottom lip for a moment before twisting in his seat to fish his phone out of his pocket. “Alright, we need to shut your brain off.” 

Aziraphale frowns. “That is not allowed.” 

“I paid for two hours of wi-fi.” Crowley uses his free hand to beckon Aziraphale closer. “Come on, let’s look at videos on the internet until your brain says enough.” 

Aziraphale keeps frowning. Of all the tricks doctors suggested during the years, videos on the internet were never on any list. “I could ask for some relaxing herbal tea.”
Crowley scoffs. “Come here and shut up for once in your life.” 

And, well. Aziraphale may not like the internet very much, but he is truly desperate for just a few hours of rest. And he’s not about to refuse some extra closeness, not when Crowley is being so caring and thoughtful. It makes him feel all tingly.

God. The exhaustion is making him feel way too many things.

He scoots over on his seat until he’s close enough to see the phone screen. He looks and shuts up as Crowley wanted for about fifteen seconds, before it gets too much. “Seriously? A video about the pyramids?” 

Crowley merely clicks his tongue and uses his thumb to change the video. “You’re always babbling about your documentaries.” 

“I do not watch documentaries about the pyramids - oh, not the royal gossip Crowley, please.”

Crowley’s thumb moves faster. “I’m not the one choosing - do you know what an algorithm is?”

“I wonder how low you think my intelligence - oh, this is cute.”

It’s a video, with captions this time. Aziraphale is grateful for it, as the muted images from before were making him feel a bit like a fish in a tank. He spares a little thought for Lola, hoping she’s floating happily right now. 

In the video, a black labrador puppy grows up as his family documents all of the milestones: the puppy’s first bottle, the puppy’s first wobbly runs, the not-so-puppy-looking-anymore first trip to the dog park. 

“Puppies? Really?” 

Aziraphale glances sideways to Crowley. “It’s your algorithm, isn’t it?”

Crowley, in response, changes the video. Aziraphale glares. “I was watching it.” 

“Relax, angel. Here, more videos of your new friend.” 

Looking back down at the screen, Aziraphale indeed finds the same dog, now more grown up and splashing around happily in the middle of a mud puddle. He smiles, not looking at the screen.

Four or five videos in, his eyelids start to feel heavier. They’ve tricked him before, so he doesn’t expect much as he tries to relax his body further. Who knows, he may find himself with eyes wide open and a very active brain five minutes from now.

Still, as new videos keep coming their way under Crowley’s thumb motions, his head starts to feel much lighter and his vision blurs. This may indeed be happening. He spares half a thought for his doctor and a very important call he has to make regarding the benefits of silly videos on the internet. He doesn’t even notice he’s leaning against Crowley’s shoulder before he feels a movement under his cheek. 

“See?” A whisper above him. “Told you.” 

Aziraphale makes some kind of sound in agreement. On the screen, the puppy is now a fully grown dog who’s destroying a pillow on a very comfortable looking sofa. Finally, he decides to trust his body and let his eyes fall shut.

The last thing he hears before going under is a soft, soft, “Goodnight, angel,” whispered in his hair.

He hopes Crowley catches his answering smile. 

Eden Resort, Landaa Giraavaru, Maldives - 11 days before Christmas 

Aziraphale pops his own sunglasses on. He will admit he missed the sun on his skin and a warm, humid breeze blowing his shirt. 

One plane ride, one seaplane ride and a small ferry ride later, they’re finally on land again. The Eden Resort is their final destination: the exotic, exclusive and all inclusive paradise Gabriel and Rory selected for their guests. 

Standing right outside the lobby of the resort, Crowley whistles between his teeth. Aziraphale shares the sentiment. 

Rich trees and plants line up the path to the beachfront real estate. The sand is white and powdery, not a single jagged shell in sight, the clear, cerulean water dotted with lucky morning swimmers relaxing under the bright blue sky. It is scenic, indeed. 

“You know, I’ll give it to the tossers. This place is nice.”

“Nice? A four letter word, coming from you?” 

“Shut up,” Crowely retorts. “I’m too tired for your witty little remarks.” 

Aziraphale sighs and walks toward the wooden sign on the doorway, reading ‘Welcome to Eden!’, and he rolls his eyes at the, frankly, quite audacious name. 

As soon as he reads the sign, the door swings open and two men in crisp white polo shirts, matching trousers and no shoes in sight come up to them. Aziraphale notices how alike they look, wondering if his exhausted mind is just playing tricks on him. 

“Welcome to Eden!” One says, holding a hand out towards what looks like a concierge desk. “We are so happy to have you here!” The other one adds, shaking both of their hands. 

The blonde woman at the desk smiles as well. “Welcome to Eden!”

Aziraphale wonders if they know how redundant it all is. Still, he smiles at her. “Hello. Thank you very much.” Crowley, beside him, grunts something. 

The woman keeps smiling. “My name is Maggie and I’m one of the concierges here at Eden. Feel free to ask for me whenever you may need something during your stay.” 

Aziraphale extends a hand toward Crowley and wiggles his fingers. Wordlessly, he hands him his passport with a nod. “Thank you, Maggie. The reservation should be under Fell.”

At the mention of the name, Maggie’s already bright demeanour changes into something even brighter. And, unfortunately, louder. “Oh! You’re here for the wedding, obviously!”

Obviously. Aziraphale ignores the twitching in his right eye. “It seems so, yes.”

Maggie’s eyes go round as she opens Aziraphale’s passport. “Are you the brother of the groom?” She asks, her delicately manicured fingers already hovering the phone to her right. “Your brother specifically requested to be called as soon as you got here.” 

He’s been in paradise for less than fifteen minutes and he’s already feeling closer to hell. Of course he doesn’t get a single day of break from Gabriel’s antics. 

“Listen, uh, Maggie, right?” Crowley speaks up for the first time. “We’ve been travelling for days, we probably - well, definitely smell and we are not in the mood to meet the family, do you know what I mean?” There is a bill rolled up between his index and middle finger, and Aziraphale winces internally as he covers Crowley’s hand with his own before Maggie notices anything. 

“What my darling partner means,” he squeezes Crowley’s hand. “Could we maybe postpone the call until we had time to freshen up a little bit?” He hopes the pointed glance he sends Crowley conveys the let’s save the corruption for the zumba day he cannot voice out loud. 

He’s met with a deeper frown. “Well, angel, I’m sure me and Maggie here could find a mutually beneficial arrangement-”

They don’t need a phone call, nor some kind of corruption tactic. Aziraphale would recognize those footsteps anywhere. Gabriel is somehow able to be loud even when he walks. 

Stalling won't delay the inevitable. With a deep sigh and a barely hidden grimace, he turns around. In a motion smooth enough to surprise him, Crowley takes his hand properly, and gives it a squeeze.

Gabriel looks - well, he looks the same as he did the last time Aziraphale saw him, five or ten or fifteen years ago. He lost count, honestly. But time seems to have stopped when he looks over at his brother: same jet black hair, not even a speck of grey at his temples, same chiseled jaw with no trace of facial hair in sight, same muscular build which is honestly offensive for a man who’s pushing fifty. The all white, linen ensemble he’s wearing is definitely a new development, but it fits the breathy, beachy mood of the resort. 

He’s also smiling, and it’s… more open than it was before. Still too wide, still too many teeth, but less creepy than before. 

“If it isn’t my baby brother!” Gabriel booms. There’s not another way to describe the sounds that come out of that man’s mouth. He’s always been loud, even when they were children, and the years have only gotten him louder. Aziraphale manages a weak smile and an ever weaker hand wave in his direction.

With two quick strides, Gabriel stands in front of him in all of his taller, broader glory and pats

Aziraphale on the shoulders, twice. For a terrifying moment, he feared Gabriel may have gone for a hug. “Look at you! You’re still so blond!”

Aziraphale merely blinks. “Yes, well. That tends to happen to blond people.” Crowley exhales sharply next to him. Aziraphale squeezes his hand again. 

Gabriel’s teeth shine in a menacing way when he shakes his head. “No one ever believes me when I show them pictures. Rory here was so sure it couldn’t be natural!” 

Aziraphale didn’t expect his first conversation with his future brother in law to be about the state of his hair. Let alone he expected said future brother in law to look like… that. The brown haired version of Gabriel Fell is looking back at him with an even broader, even toothier smile, and an identical all white shirt and shorts matching set. 

Well - Rory’s eyes are dark, and he’s slightly shorter than Gabriel, but the wide shoulders, big arms, squared jaw - they look like brothers way more than Aziraphale and Gabriel ever did. 

He’s not sure how this information makes him feel. He’s not surprised about his brother dating a clone of himself, though. Somehow, that tracks. 

Remembering his manners, he shakes himself out of the weird reverie. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Rory,” he smiles, extending one hand. 

Apparently, Rory doesn’t share his brother’s reservations about physical contact, because he surges forward with a squeal and plants a kiss on Aziraphale’s forehead. “Namaste and love, baby brother,” he whispers. “I am so glad to finally have you here.” 

Aziraphale truly doesn’t want to know what expression is currently plaguing his features. He clears his throat and takes a step back, dragging Crowley with him by their still entwined hands. 

“Right, erm. Best not do that to me, mate.” Crowley says, the first words he utters in the whole… exchange. He coughs. It’s truly a terrible fake cough. “Must have caught something on the plane.” 

He glances over his incredibly supportive partner and gives his hand a tighter squeeze. “You poor dear,” he quips. He feels Crowley’s tendons spasming under his grip, and relents a bit. “We should definitely go and sleep it off-”

“Oh! The boyfriend!” Gabriel moves his unnatural smile to Crowley and claps him on the shoulders as well. Crowley jumps. “You - you’re real!”

Aziraphale’s left eye twitches. Crowley opens and closes his mouth twice. “What?” 

“Don’t listen to him,” Rory cups Crowley’s cheek and… boops him on the nose. There are suddenly nails digging into Aziraphale’s palm, and he has to bite down on his bottom lip, hard, to stay still. “Another brother. What a blessing.” 

Gabriel, for some reason, laughs. “I merely thought, for a moment mind you, that you may have made him up, baby brother.” He gives Aziraphale’s shoulder another squeeze. “But look at you! A ginger!”

Aziraphale grinds his jaw so hard he hears a crack, lips tight in a closed-mouthed smile. He glances over at Crowley, who looks between the two brothers for a moment. Dropping his hand, he pulls Aziraphale in by his shirt, slinging his arm around his waist. 

Just what Aziraphale needed. Good Lord. 

“Right, so. Anthony Crowley, charmed, I’m sure. Very real. Very, uh, very much not made up.” 

“Well!” Aziraphale manages to unlock his jaw. “Also very, very tired, as I’m sure you can imagine.” 

Someone clears his voice behind them, and Aziraphale looks back at Maggie like he imagines a castaway would look at shore. She shoots him a smile and slides a shiny white key card in his direction. “Your room is ready, Mr Fell.” She hands him a form detailing the resort’s rules and a pen. “It’s one of our loveliest bungalows. Very spacious, very cosy. You have access to room service twenty four hours a day, and you may contact me for whatever you may need during your stay. You also have access to a private hot tub and a private beach you can walk to from your porch. Anything else is -”

“Thanks, Maggie.” Crowley cuts her off, ever so nicely, and digs into his pocket to retrieve his wallet and a sleek, black credit card. Aziraphale doesn’t fight the urge to roll his eyes - what a show off. 

Gabriel laughs once again and bats Crowley’s hand away. “Don’t be silly, Anthony. I have my card on file for every room, you just sign the privacy policy and don’t worry about a thing.”

“It’s Crowley.” They say simultaneously. Aziraphale flushes lightly as the arm around his waist tightens. “He doesn’t go by his first name.”

The next smile gracing Gabriel’s features is more similar to the ones Aziraphale grew up with. “That’s peculiar.” 

Aziraphale smiles back. For a second, he’s eighteen again and he’s attending his family Christmas Dinner at his family’s manor and Gabriel is asking him questions about degrees in literature and old bookshops. “Yes, well. We are all entitled to preferences.”

Rory claps his hand again, which doesn’t help with the whole clone thing. “Excellent! You’ll love your bungalow so much, Aziraphale and Crowley darling. The decor is divine and the linens, oh my God! I didn't believe such a high thread count was a thing!” 

Aziraphale picks up his discarded duffle bag, but Maggie gently intervenes again. “You can leave your cases with Eric and Derek,” she points at the two men who originally welcomed them. Why does everyone have a doppelganger in this resort? “Guys, please bring their luggage to Bungalow 1941.” 

With a nod and an identical smile (goodness gracious), Eric and Derek set off, and Aziraphale is left with his brother and his clone-like fiancé, once again, in the lobby of this resort. His head is starting to spin. 

Crowley tugs him closer. “Very nice to meet you both, but I think we’ll have a nap now.”

Aziraphale is nodding enthusiastically before the sentence is out of Crowley’s mouth. “Yes, please. We are both quite tired.” 

He is tired, actually. The two hour nap on the plane didn’t do much for the previous sleepless night and the early flight, nice as it was to wake up on a lightly snoring Crowley. Aziraphale spent the rest of the flight watching him, too tired to feel any embarrassment. 

“You look dead on your feet, angel.” Crowley whispers, and for an instant there as Aziraphale smiles at him there is no Gabriel and no Gabriel’s clone, no wedding and no farce. It’s just Aziraphale and his best friend whose hair looks on fire when hit by the Maldivian golden sun. 

Of course, that’s when Rory breaks the moment with a high pitched squeal. “Angel? Oh that is so adorable. Gabey-baby, did you hear that? Why don’t you ever call me angel?”

There is nothing stopping the incredulous Gabey-baby slipping out of Crowley’s mouth. Aziraphale rolls his lips and clears his throat. 

Gabriel eyes the both of them with a raised eyebrow. “We’ll see you both tonight at the Welcome Dinner, right?”

How Aziraphale wishes he could simply refuse. The resort looks nice, and the hot tub and private beach sound heavenly, especially since they’re free. What wouldn’t he give to be able to enjoy them without the wedding looming over his head. He forces himself to nod. “You will. It was nice to -”

Crowley scoffs and starts walking backwards. “Bye!” 

Aziraphale lets himself be dragged away, hiding a snicker behind his hand. “Bye? Seriously?” 

Crowley shakes his head. “Hush. I need a moment to elaborate whatever the hell that was.” 

Aziraphale shares the sentiment, and giggles again. He places a hand on Crowley’s chest and lets himself enjoy the closeness for a few moments longer. 

It’s going to be a long, long wedding. But at least he’s not alone.

“I can’t believe you’re forcing me to get up.” 

The room - bungalow, actually - is beautiful. It looks just like someone out of the Home and Garden magazine Aziraphale likes to peruse monthly. The dark hardwood floor contrasts nicely with the crispy white fabric draped over the furniture, stunning pieces timeless in their elegance. The design is as exquisite as Rory promised, beach chic and quietly luxurious. Aziraphale was immediately enamored with the sitting area, the cream couches and the overstuffed armchair put right in front of the bed. 

The dark, hardwood bed they are currently laying on is so wide it’s almost outrageous, the linens softer than Aziraphale thought was possible. 

From the large glass door leading outside to the hot tub and private beach, Aziraphale can spot the sun setting over the ocean in a whirlwind of orange and red. He sighs, popping a grape into his mouth - the welcome basket was very much appreciated. 

“I’m not forcing you to do anything.” He comments. “You wanted to come here. We actually had a fight because you wanted to do this and I didn’t.” 

Crowley turns and props his head onto his arm, his other one outstretched and pointing to the bamboo fan whirling lazily above the bed. “Look at this place. Was I wrong?” 

Aziraphale doesn’t want to give in and giggle, but his lips are trembling. “I will admit I was scared before seeing it. Gabriel’s taste isn’t usually…” He trails off, wiggling his fingers to emphasize the point. “I guess Rory is a positive influence.” 

Crowley snorts. “That’s his not-so-evil twin.” 

“Did you see it?” Aziraphale turns around so he’s facing Crowley properly. “I thought I was seeing things!” 

“It’s terrifying. Absolutely terrifying. I had to pinch my leg to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating.” 

Aziraphale lets go and giggles into his pillow. “It makes so much sense for Gabriel to be marrying himself.” 

Outside, the sky is turning pink. Aziraphale knows they will have to get up soon and join the rest of the party for the welcome dinner. But staying here, laying in a giant soft bed in matching bathrobes and snacking on grapes and pineapple and watermelon while the sun sets over the ocean outside, is getting more tempting by the second. 

Aziraphale sighs again. “We need to get ready.” 

Predictably, Crowley groans. “Can’t we skip it?” His voice is muffled by the hundreds of pillows he’s currently buried into.

“Tomorrow is Day One, which means,” Aziraphale uses all of his will power to peel himself off the bed and get up. “Zumba Day. If we want to skip something -”

“Fuck.” 

“What’s with you and zumba, anyway?” Aziraphale asks, as if the mere thought of the word zumba doesn’t make the hair on the back of his neck raise. He enters their walk-in closet - apparently, Eric and Derek took the time to unpack for them as well - to scan his options. “What do you think the dress code is tonight? They didn’t say.” 

They did say what the dress code for the wedding is, though, a very predictable and boring total white that made Aziraphale’s nose scrunch up. 

Crowley tosses and turns on the bed. “I honestly couldn’t care less. And you don’t get the zumba story on the first day.”

“Does that mean I’ll get it eventually?” Aziraphale selects a lilac shirt Crowley made him buy on one of their shopping trips. It’s in the cut he usually wears, though the material is obviously lighter and pleasantly softer, and the colour is new for him. It will go well with the cream linen trousers he usually wears during the summer. “I’ll take the bathroom first, dear.”

Still on the bed, now on his stomach with his hair sticking up everywhere and his face still mushed into the pillows, Crowley mumbles something affirmative. 

The bathroom is as breathy as the rest of the room, with lighter wooden floor, double wash basins and a shower with too many bits and bobbles Aziraphale can’t even begin to understand.

He runs a hand through his hair, tugging lightly at the light blond curls. Still blond, as Gabriel said. Still different from the rest of his entire family, as Aziraphale remembered. The brief nap has done wonders for his under eye bags, who have decided to give him a break. There’s nothing to do for the crows-feet in the corner of his eyes, a genetic curse he took after his mother. He squints at himself in the mirror: no, the blue of Gabriel’s eyes is not the same as his own. 

He dresses quickly, sure they are already late as it is, and when he gets out of the bathroom Crowley is standing up and already dressed, in a black v-neck shirt, slightly looser dark trousers than his usual and - “What are you wearing?” 

Crowley looks up and grins, dangling one foot. “We’re at the beach. I’m getting comfortable.” 

Aziraphale blinks at the hot pink flip flops, willing them away with sheer power of manifestation. They stay where they are, and he looks back up at Crowley’s face. He’s fixed his hair in an almost boyish fringe, and his sunglasses are hooked into the neck of his shirt, deepening the neckline and putting even more attention on his collarbones. He looks handsome, of course he does, a fact that makes the flip flops even more outrageous. “Must they be hot pink? And… plastic?” 

Crowley takes two steps and demonstrates their squeaky sound. He looks elated. “Beach attire, angel. Keep up.”

“I hate you.” Aziraphale comments, eyes still fixed on the pink monstrosity. “I really, really hate you.” 

Crowley snorts. His fingers creep forward and gently touch the hem of Aziraphale’s sleeve. “‘S nice.”

Aziraphale looks up. Yes, the brown of Crowley’s eyes is different than Rory’s: softer, richer, warmer. “You picked it up.”

“I was right,” Crowley shrugs, fingers still grazing the fabric. “It brings out your eyes.” 

Before Aziraphale can even begin to process the words or the blush they brought on Crowley’s cheek, flip-flops clad feet are already squeaking away and he’s holding the bungalow’s door open, white key card already in hand. “Shall we?”

A long wedding. A long, long Christmas. 

He smiles. “Lead the way.”

Fairy lights. An imperial table full of baby’s breath and golden chandeliers. Some anachronistic Christmas trees on the edge of the wooden platform where the imperial table is built upon, but it’s a Christmas wedding, so he gets it. 

The twinkly lights are all around them, above their head creating a shiny cocoon, on the floor around each chair, on the table between the chandeliers. 

“They don’t know the meaning of plastic waste, do they?”

Aziraphale gives Crowley a look. “You’re wearing plastic shoes, darling,” he whispers back. 

They’re sitting halfway down the right side of the table, three chairs down Gabriel and Rory’s seats of honour at the head of said table, where they’re currently greeting guests with a handshake (Gabriel) and a kiss on the cheek (Rory). He and Crowely managed to avoid further physical contact by sprinting to their seats when they were distracted.

Crowley is sitting next to Rory's grandmother, apparently, who is a chatty lady with bright white hair who Crowley has already whispered bad things about multiple times. 

The seats next to Aziraphale are still empty, for now. He just hopes Rory has enough cousins and friends to keep his own cousins from sitting next to him. 

“And you are Gabriel’s little brother, dear? I’m Margaret.” Rory’s grandmother leans over the table to greet Aziraphale. “You look nothing alike!”

Thank God the wine has already been served. “I know.” 

Margaret leans closer to them, one hand on Crowley’s shoulder, who looks at it like it’s a burning iron. “Don’t tell him I said that, but you’re prettier. Look at those curls!” she whispers with a wink. “And look at this man of yours!”

Better and better. This evening is already shaping up to be a fantastic time. Aziraphale gives Margaret a tight smile and a nod, placing what he hopes is a placating hand on Crowley’s bouncing knee. “Why is everyone in his family harassing us?” He asks through gritted teeth, knee bouncing high enough to hit the table in rhythmic thuds. 

“I told you this was a bad idea.” Aziraphale replies, downing his first glass of the evening. “And we didn’t even get through the amuse bouche.”

One by one, the seats start to fill up. By some miracle (Aziraphale does not want to give Gabriel’s planning any merit) the worst of his cousins end up sitting at the far end of the table, only greeting Aziraphale in passing and sparing a raised eyebrow for Crowley. 

“What a warm welcome,” he comments, wiggling his fingers to a sour looking Michael. Then again, Aziraphale can’t remember a time when Michael didn’t look sour. She nods in Aziraphale’s direction and goes to sit next to Sandy and Sarah. 

“Be grateful they invited the three of them only.” Aziraphale shudders at the mere thought of his entire extended family attending the celebration. Thank God Aunt Beatrice fainted the Easter Sunday Aziraphale first uttered the word ‘gay’; Gabriel should have done more than pay for his entire stay merely for freeing him of her company. 

Muriel is the last to arrive. She’s the youngest cousin of the Fell clan, and Aziraphale has thought multiple times she must be adopted: no one else in the family has a heart so big or a personality so warm, if a bit naive at times. Aziraphale can honestly say he missed her. 

As soon as she spots him, she sends one of her bright, bubbly smiles and a hand wave, and he reciprocates, genuine for the first time that night. “Let’s talk tomorrow!” She mouths before taking her seat next to the rest of the cousins, and Aziraphale nods and gives her what he hopes is a sympathetic look. Muriel doesn’t have it in herself to hate anyone, but no one deserves to sit more than ten minutes next to Sandy Fell. 

“She was the nice one, wasn’t she?” Crowley’s warm breath on his ear doesn’t fail to send shivers down Aziraphale’s spine. It’s not even the first time that night; better get used to it.
He nods. “I’m going to introduce myself to the lady next to me.” 

“Why?” Crowley frowns. “Have you not been harassed enough?”

Aziraphale ignores him. “Hello!” He chirps. The lady turns around and looks at him with big dark eyes. “I’m Aziraphale Fell. This is my… partner, Anthony Crowley.” 

“Mmh.” Aziraphale elbows him. “Hi.”

The lady tucks a long strand of brown hair behind her ear and eyes them curiously behind thick glasses. “Anathema Device. This is my husband, Newt.” A plain looking man beside her waves a hand. “You’re the brother, right?” 

“He looks like a question mark.” Crowley whispers. Aziraphale elbows him again. “I am. And you are…?”

“I’m Rory’s sister. Guess we are the weird name siblings.” When she smiles, Aziraphale finally spots the family resemblance he should have first seen in those dark eyes. “That’s cute,” she adds with a bigger smile. 

Aziraphale blinks and looks down at himself. “What?” Crowley beats him to the question.

“Oh, I’m a witch, actually.” She waves a hand dismissively. Crowley chokes on the wine he was sipping. “Your auras match. That’s cute.” 

As Aziraphale was just thinking, it just gets better and better. He picks up his wine glass again. “Splendid.” 

“Cuckoo family,” Crowley whispers in his ear again, and he gets yet another elbow in the ribs.

Finally, the waiters appear with the first course. The food is one of the only reasons that convinced him to get out of bed, actually, and everything that happened in the last few minutes is proving him it was the wrong choice. He hopes the menu will at least be up to his standards. 

The shrimp tartare is good, though he would have preferred less lemon grass. Nothing to write home about, all in all. When Crowley slides his plate closer to Aziraphale, he doesn’t complain. Crowley just grins at him and lets him have it.

“Excuse me? Excuse me, everyone?” Rory stands up clinking his glass with a fork. Aziraphale wrinkles his nose, and he’s pretty sure Anathema mutters something like somebody sedate him next to him. 

“As all of you know, I’m Rory and this is my fiancé Gabriel.” He giggles. “God. It’s so surreal to say it out loud.” 

Crowley leans towards him again. “Tell me when I have to fake a vomit emergency.”

“Hush.” Aziraphale doesn’t exclude he will be the one faking the emergency, honestly. 

“We are both so overjoyed tonight, looking at this table and feeling all the love flowing, oh.” Rory is now dabbing at his eyes with a napkin. “Thank you all so much for being here. You don’t know how much it means to us.” 

Gabriel stands up as well when Rory’s hiccups become too loud to be ignored. Aziraphale understands the whole sedation business. “What my lover said. Now, my wonderful Rory had the brilliant idea to use this dinner as a way to get to know each other better!” 

Better and better. Better and better. “How convincing can you be?” 

Crowley has never smiled wider. “Angel, I could have won a BAFTA if I tried hard enough.” 

Rory seems to have been invigorated by the praises. “Starting from me, everyone will say his name, where he’s from, what he does for a living and a fun fact about themselves! How does that sound?” He and Gabriel clap excitedly, while the rest of the table hesitantly claps back. 

“My name is Rory Device, soon to be Fell, I’m from Los Angeles but I live in London, I’m a therapist and my favourite musical is The Sound of Music! Come on Mum, it’s your turn!” 

Crowley stares at Aziraphale pleadingly. Aziraphale is unable to say anything, The Sound of Music and endless winter nights spent watching it in his family house reverberating in his brain like a montage from hell. Rory is truly Gabriel’s doppelganger and this is, literally, Aziraphale’s worst nightmare.

“Angel, I’m next.” Crowley urges. “If I need to throw up on Gran’s shoes you need to tell me now.”

Aziraphale can simply stare at his wine glass. “I cannot believe he said The Sound of Music.” 

Margaret is now wrapping up her fun fact - apparently, though Aziraphale cannot say he’s very much surprised, she holds seances and can talk to people beyond the veil. Cuckoo family, indeed - and it’s Crowley’s turn. He sends a murderous glance in Aziraphale’s direction and downs his wine glass like it’s a shot. “Anthony Crowley. London. I do stuff, book stuff mostly, antique stuff sometimes. Hi.” 

The table falls into a rather stunned silence. Aziraphale does his best to not burst out laughing. Judging by Gabriel’s face, he is now sure Crowley works for the mob, given the job description. 

Rory, sunny as ever, doesn’t even flinch. “Cool! And what about the fun fact?” 

Crowley’s fingers turn white where they’re holding the crystal stem of the glass. “The fun fact,” he echoes, emphasizing every F. “You see, I don’t think my boss would approve of me divulging any fun facts.”

Aziraphale snorts. He can’t help it. He tries to hide behind his glass, but he’s sure the silence fallen upon the table and the smile threatening to burst out of his lips give him away. “Don’t say that, darling.” He’s always known the improvisation class he took in university would be useful eventually. “I’m sure he wouldn’t mind them knowing about the cat.”

Crowley watches him with arching eyebrows. “The cat.” He repeats, as well lips trembling. “Right. Mr. Whiskers. He’s only got one eye and no tail, but he’s a fine cat.” 

“He’s cute enough, given everything.” He nods in Gabriel’s direction. “You know how it is with collateral damage.” 

“Every day with Mr. Whiskers is a gift.” Crowley lifts his glass in a silent toast. “Literally. He wasn’t supposed to live another week.”

Aziraphale hears Anathema snorting beside him, while everyone else at the table is sporting a progressively horrified expression. Smiling, Aziraphale clinks Crowley’s still raised glass. “My name is Aziraphale Fell, born and raised in London, I’m a bookkeeper and I sometimes date the dark and looming figures roaming around my shop.” 

Anathema cackles loudly, her grandmother following shortly after, clapping at the both of them, her “new favourite comedians,” apparently. Rory drops the confused, borderline worried expression for another serene smile, clapping lightly and urging his sister to go on. Gabriel is smiling the usual, familiar murderous smile he usually reserves for Aziraphale. 

Under the table, Crowley squeezes his knee. “You are way more insane than I am,” he whispers, the smiling lines by his eyes betraying his expression. 

Aziraphale pats the hand on top of his. “Next time, I’ll let you do your bit.” 

Crowley grins. “See? Are you not having fun?” 

Damn him, Aziraphale is. Grant this is one of the weirdest evenings (well, weirdest days) of his life so far, but it’s not been completely horrible. Half of the table thinks they are criminals and the other half of it thinks they are insane. His brother wants to kill him and they still have to find a way to skip zumba tomorrow, and possibly karaoke on day five. 

“Oh, I am. You are not allowed to tell me you told me so.” 

“Told you so, Aziraphale-cakes.” 

Aziraphale’s loud snicker interrupts one of Rory’s friends in the middle of her fun fact. 

There are a couple of birds on their little porch. Small little things, with bright yellow bellies and a speck of blue on their necks, a red mark on their beaks that reminds Aziraphale of lipstick. 

He smiles. “Hello little friends.” 

Farther back, the waves roll silently on the moonlit beach, their shushing noise a gentle background. It’s a clear night: there are so many stars, the moon shines so bright the sand looks silver. It’s quiet, not eerily so. It’s the kind of quiet one can enjoy, the kind of quiet that can lull someone to sleep.

One of the birds tilts a little head in Aziraphale’s direction, hopping closer to his feet. “I apologise, I can’t offer you anything.” The companion pecks the wooden floor twice before chirping lightly, making Aziraphale smile again. “I know, I know, very rude of me.” 

“Why are you a bloody Disney princess?” Crowley slides the rest of the glass window open, plopping down on the chaise longue next to Aziraphale. The birds fly away in a flutter of wings. 

“You’re a Disney villain.” He pouts. “I was making friends.”

“Bananaquits.” Crowley says. “Cute little buggers. Same family as the hummingbird.” 

Aziraphale shakes his head. “Do you also do bird stuff in your free time?” 

Crowley nudges his shoulder. “Collateral damage.” He’s smiling. “You’re a freak.”

Aziraphale focuses his gaze back on the sea. He breathes in, salty air tingling his nose. 

He missed the sea. Save from that infamous Brighton trip with Crowley years back, he hasn’t been to the beach in a good decade. Certainly, not this kind of beach. He is not the kind of person to randomly escape to a tropical destination; the beaches he did frequent in his lifetime are the typical chilly English beaches, with one notable exception of one summer spent in the French Riviera. 

The sea is different here. It looks wider, even more infinite, the blue melting into the horizon and the gentle waves caressing the Earth with a softness the sea back home does not possess. 

“It truly is a beautiful place.”

Crowley hums. “Can’t believe those two picked it.” 

“I have decided to appoint all the merits to the wedding planner.” 

“Good idea.” Crowley taps his fingers three times on his right leg. “Can I ask you something?”

Aziraphale keeps his gaze fixed on the sea, and nods slowly. He expects some questions, after a day like this.

“How is Gabriel so awful?” 

Aziraphale smiles. He asked himself the same question so many times during his life. He wondered about it over broken toys, stolen clothes, sabotaged bicycles, ridiculed studies, mocked books. He pondered the question over every line of Little Women, every chapter of To Kill a Mockingbird, every page of Pride and Prejudice. Every time he thinks about brothers, he thinks about Gabriel, and he thinks about how different things would have turned out for him, had his family been different. 

“I’m not sure,” he breathes out. “We’ve always been different, in every way.” 

Tale as old as time: one sporty, one bookish; one loud, one quiet; one pragmatic, the other a dreamer. “I wasn’t the brother he wanted, he wasn’t the brother I wanted. We never worked it out, and I doubt we ever will.”

“I don’t like him.” Crowley mumbles. Aziraphale smiles: it’s mutual as it is obvious. “He looks at you all… murderous.” 

Aziraphale laughs. “I believe we are both on his black list, after tonight.” 

“Good. Fucker.” Crowley feet, still cladded in the godforsaken plastic shoes, toy with a bit of sand the wind carried on the porch. “His doppelganger is a nutter.” 

“I don’t believe he’s a bad person.” Aziraphale says slowly. “I do think he has a good influence on Gabriel.” As far as he knows, Gabriel started trying to mend their relationship around the time he and Rory got together. Even if it’s not a successful attempt, it is more than whatever happened in the fifteen years before.

“Aziraphale. He’s a therapist who’s now marrying a client.” Crowley deadpans. “I’m pretty sure that’s wrong.” 

Aziraphale grimaces. “Well. It’s - perhaps they - alright. That is bad.” 

“And his sister is a witch.” 

“I like her.” He recalls her mutterings with a smirk. “I think she doesn’t like her brother very much.” 

“Good to know. She’s an ally.” Crowley says, dead serious. “Even though her husband looks like… that.”

“I agree. She’s so pretty and he’s…”

“There.”

“There.” 

Aziraphale smiles and looks at the ocean again. The breeze has picked up a bit from earlier in the evening, messing his hair in a pleasant way. He’d like to sleep with the window open tonight. 

Speaking of. 

He’s not exactly stalling. He knew there would only be one bed when he confirmed the trip, and it’s not like it would be their first sleepover. They spent the night together more times than Aziraphale can count, over the years: Crowley on a sofa, Aziraphale on an overstuffed armchair. The bed has always been off limits, somehow, for no particular reason.

Well. The particular reason being the fact that they’re not together, have never been together, have never thought about getting together. 

But now they have to spend ten days in a couples bungalow in paradise while acting together and never leaving each other’s side and Aziraphale may or may not be thinking about their matching auras. 

He stands up. He needs to dip his toes in the water. 

“Where are you going?” Crowley asks his back. “You nutter.” 

The water is warm. Aziraphale didn’t expect it to be chilly, but the warmth of it is as pleasant as it feels unnatural. The delicate foam tickles his feet. 

“A midnight dip, angel? Wouldn’t have thought so.”

Aziraphale turns around and laughs at Crowley hopping around the wet sand like an overgrown flaming. “What are you doing?”

“Have you ever gotten wet sand into flip flops?” He squeals, dangling one foot.

“Take those things off.” 

“Buy me dinner first.” Crowley glares and mumbles, looking even more murderous than Gabriel did during dinner. He leaves the hot pink horrors on the wet stripe before the water, and reaches Aziraphale. “Oh, it’s warm.” 

“It’s nice.” Aziraphale breathes. “It’s beautiful.”

He has never seen Crowley under the moonlight before. He has never seen him in a short-sleeve shirt at the beach, pale skin glistening and goosebumps rising. He has never seen him smiling down at foamy water, glancing back up at Aziraphale with his eyes unguarded and his face so open. He looks young, he looks happy. He looks free. 

Aziraphale can’t look at anything else. “Are you having fun?” 

“Yeah, kind of.” Crowley takes a step closer and gently kicks warm water at Aziraphale’s ankle, his smile all lopsided. 

Aziraphale steps back. “Don’t you dare, you scoundrel.”

“Scoundrel? How old are you?” Crowley kicks more water. “You’re the one who got in the water.”

“A child.” Aziraphale bends down to roll his trousers further up. “I’m here with a child.” He uses his position to splash a bit of water on Crowley’s shins. He’s nothing if a bit competitive, after all.

Crowley steps back and shakes his head. “Oh, alright. It’s on.”

It is, indeed, on. There is nothing like handing a tiny bit of competition to two grown men to turn them back into boys. Aziraphale’s holidays during his boyhood did not feature a lot of water splashing, certainly not at night, but he feels young as he and Crowley jump around in the shallow water, making a mess of trousers and shirts, squealing in a way they will both later deny. 

He feels young and he feels free and unfortunately also damp, as he jumps around to avoid splashes and progressively more colourful expletives thrown at him. Since he’s anything but young, one jump was bound to go bad; his knees are not what they used to be and hopping around wet sand and rolling waves is not the best idea he’s ever had, despite his current feelings, so he trips. 

What happens next does not surprise him. Crowley catches him. It makes sense: somehow, he knew he wouldn’t fall face first into the water. He knew two arms would snake around his waist and keep him upright, despite the wobbliness of the next few moments. 

What he didn’t know is how solid Crowley’s chest would feel under his hands, how deep the fingers on his back would sink, how warm their mingled breaths would feel on his nose. 

How Crowley’s eyes are still bright and ablaze even in the dark, how the wrinkles by the side of his eyelids are deeper than he’s ever seen them, how his canine bites into his bottom lip to contain his grin. 

Aziraphale swallows, and follows the same movement on Crowley’s throat. “You caught me.” 

“Did that,” Crowley’s eyes dart all over his face. “Guess I won.”

“You absolutely didn’t.” Aziraphale smiles. “It wasn’t even a competition. We didn’t have a judge.” 

Crowley’s eyebrows shoot higher as he tightens his arms around Aziraphale’s middle. “A judge? Seriously? Does your highness require a referee for some splashing on the beach?”

“Clearly, when playing with a child.” His own hands creep up higher, resting just under Crowley’s collarbone. In the back of his mind, he wonders whether they should talk about this. What even is this?  

Crowley opens his mouth, but whatever the retort is swallowed by a loud, unmistakingly loud, “Boys?” 

No one can make Aziraphale’s smile drop as fast as Gabriel does. He’s a bit farther than where they’re standing, so he raises his voice to be heard. “What’s the matter?”  

“I’m so, so glad you two are having fun.” But. There is always a but when it comes to him. “But can you maybe move the fun inside your room? Rory needs his full eight hours of sleep to balance out his chakras, you know how it is.” 

“We don’t, actually.” Crowley replies, fingers sinking deeper into Aziraphale’s lower back. “Thanks for the suggestion.” 

Even from a distance, Aziraphale is sure Gabriel’s left eye is twitching. Still, he doesn’t drop the smile. “I suggest you both go to sleep. Tomorrow will be a long day. A long, fun day! Never a dull moment here in Eden.” 

Aziraphale sighs. He will agree to anything if it means getting Gabriel to stop with the claps, which he supposes are the physical equivalent of the exclamation points. “You can go back to your room, Gabriel. We were about to head to bed.” 

“Were we?” Crowley mutters. Aziraphale rubs absent-minded circles into his chest. 

Gabriel grins and lifts two thumbs. “Great! That’s - that’s great. Goodnight boys. Remember, eight full hours of sleep are -”

“Night!” Crowley half shouts. “And we are not boys. Haven’t been boys in twenty years, Jesus Christ.” 

If Gabriel heard the last part, he doesn’t comment on it, merely walking backwards on the beach with a renewed spring in his step. 

Aziraphale exhales, letting his head hang low for a moment. “He needs to balance out his chakras.” 

Crowley clicks his tongue. “D’you think they sleep in coffins or something?”

They’re still so close. Close enough that when Aziraphale giggles, he feels Crowley’s warm exhale ruffling his hair, his chest moving lightly under his hands.

He doesn’t want to let go. He doesn’t want to be the first to step back. 

He does, though. Because staying longer would probably mean talking about it, about something at least, and he wants that even less. “We should head to bed, actually.” He says, dropping his hands and stepping back. “This day has been… long.”

“Infinite.” Crowley drops his hands as well, lips tight. “We should, yeah.” He scratches the back of his neck. “I just don’t want to let the wanker win.” 

He’s ridiculous. He’s absolutely, utterly ridiculous. “Room service is filed under Gabriel’s card.” Aziraphale would do a million more ridiculous things if it means seeing this glimmer in Crowley’s eyes. He is absolutely, utterly hopeless. “Fancy a nightcap?”

Crowley’s grin is dangerous. “The student becomes a teacher. I might cry, angel.” 

Ridiculous. Hopelessly ridiculous. “Save the theatrics for tomorrow. It’s going to be a long day.” 

If this day felt infinite, tomorrow is going to be even worse, and so will the ten days leading up to the Christmas wedding. Ten whole days of Gabriel Fell and Rory soon-to-be Fell and his entire insane family, packed full with activities like arts and crafts and karaoke. 

Ten whole days of Anthony Crowley and his warm hands and solid arms and unbearable smile. Starting tonight, in the same room. In the same bed. 

Aziraphale looks at the stars one last time before following Crowley to the bungalow. 

At least fate chose a beautiful place for his demise. 

Chapter Text

Eden Resort, Landaa Giraavaru, Maldives - 10 days before Christmas 

One rule universally recognized about holidays is the need for a complete lack of alarm clocks. 

A holiday - or vacation, depending which side of the Atlantic Ocean one is used to - is a moment where time is suspended, a moment that exists outside reality and in which life waits just outside the door, not knocking until the very last possible instant. 

Aziraphale’s alarm clock is set for eight in the morning sharp. He won't have any trouble waking up, considering he’s already awake, and has been since five forty free, if the little clock on the bedside table is to be believed. 

They have to head to the resort main building for breakfast at forty five minutes past eight, and Aziraphale has been looking forward to breakfast ever since dinner the night before - which, after the lackluster amuse bouche, turned out to be pretty much up to his standards. Plus, he’s always been fond of buffets - the choices, the abundance, those little croissants with multiple fillings… yes, breakfast. He’s quite looking forward to it. 

Also, they have to get through breakfast with everyone if they want to have a chance at effectively skipping zumba day. If they hide the whole first day away Gabriel will definitely come looking for them, Aziraphale is sure. Or worse, he could send Rory, or another member of his… peculiar family, and that could somehow be worse. He has faith in Crowley and his acting abilities: he’s positive he will get them out of the day’s activity. 

Speaking of. 

It’s five minutes to eight now.

In five minutes, the unpleasant drill of the alarm clock will replace the quiet stillness of the room, the faint chirping sounds and the even weaker white noise of the waves rolling on the shores.

They will have to get up and get dressed and endure a whole breakfast with the rest of the wedding party and, incidentally, Crowley will have to wake up and dislodge the arm and the leg slung around Aziraphale’s waist and thigh, respectively. Aziraphale can’t say he’s looking forward to any of it, especially the last part. 

He did not expect this. Crowley has never struck him as a cuddler, by any means: every past instance of physical contact between the two of them was initiated by Aziraphale, after all, and while Crowley had reciprocated, it never lasted very long nor was it ever particularly… warm, always stained by the hinge of awkwardness between two friends who are not big on physical displays of affections. 

Yet this morning, at precisely five forty three, Aziraphale had opened his eyes and immediately felt warm. Even as he tensed at the unfamiliar hold, Crowley’s body stayed relaxed and so warm behind him, arms tightening his hold and a wet sigh tickling the back of his neck. The leg had made its appearance at six seventeen, to be exact. 

Eventually, Aziraphale relaxed. It was still a weird feeling, it was still unexpected, but it was also nice. So very, very nice. 

And he’s still relaxed, even now that they only have three minutes left. He doesn’t want Crowley to move. He’d happily stay in this position forever, actually. For a moment there, he felt his eyes grow heavy again and thought about drifting off for a while more, but then Crowley threw a leg over Aziraphale’s thigh and the relaxation process had to start all over again. 

Just two minutes now. Gosh, will it be awkward? He doesn’t want it to be awkward. He wants this to happen again tonight possibly, and every night after. He didn’t know he would crave the contact this bad, but he finds himself scooting back a little to soak up more of it, one hand on Crowley’s wrist to feel the steady rhythm of his heartbeat. 

Aziraphale closes his eyes and evens out his breathing. It won’t be awkward if they’re both sleeping, right? Nevermind the fact that he told Crowley about the insomnia and now he’ll never believe Aziraphale is still asleep at eight in the morning. Gosh but he has a big mouth, and he never thinks about the consequences of his own -

The alarm blares through the silence. Aziraphale shoots his arm forward to silence it as fast as humanly possible while desperately trying not to wake Crowley with the movement. 

He settles back into his previous positions and takes a deep breath. Two deep breaths. Three-

Crowley starts stirring behind him. His nose tickles the hair on the back of Aziraphale’s neck as he nuzzles closer, his arm tightening its hold for a moment. Aziraphale closes his eyes and breaths as slowly as he can, focusing all of his willpower into not squealing. 

“Fuck,” comes a mumble from behind him. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

So. A bit awkward, indeed.

Crowley starts removing his leg slowly, still mumbling profanities under his breath. They get more colourful by the second, Aziraphale notes, not unimpressed.

Normally, he’s a man whose actions are justified by days and sometimes even weeks of careful thought and consideration. Approximately a month ago, all that planning and thinking got thrown out of the window and now he’s here, in a Maldivian resort at eight in the morning, squeezing the wrist of his apparently very cuddly and definitely very distressed best friend while, unfortunately, squealing. “It’s fine!” 

Crowley’s next expletive is definitely louder. “Of course. Bloody Dracula’s awake.” Predictably, he removes the arm and leaves Aziraphale’s back cold. “Please, please, I’m begging you, forget about this.” 

It comes out muffled. Aziraphale sits up and turns around, finding Crowley buried face first in the many pillows. He rolls his eyes. “I’m serious. It’s fine.”

“Shut up.” Crowley frees one arm from under the pillows to throw the duvet over his hair. 

Aziraphale huffs. “Oh, good Lord Anthony.” He pulls back the duvet. “You are a grown man. I am a grown man. Must you be like this?”

“Shut up.” 

A gentler approach is needed. Aziraphale can be gentle. “Quit with the dramatics.” He wrinkles his nose. “I mean, you did nothing wrong. I know how cold you always are.” 

He remembers countless sleepovers in the backroom of his shop and Crowley’s requests for blankets upon blankets. He remembers how in the haze of alcohol he almost, almost suggested Crowley to just come closer. “It’s not an issue. I’m not mad. It was…” Warm. Safe. Something he didn’t know he wanted so bad until he got a glimpse of it and now he wants it again and again and again. “Nice.” 

“Nice.” Another grumble from the pillow. “I don’t do nice.”

“I do.” Aziraphale dares to touch the arm poking out the mountain of pillows. “I almost fell asleep again.” 

At that, Crowley turns his head. Half of his face is wrinkled by a night spent buried in high thread cotton sheets, his once coiffed hair is now a mess and his heavy lidded eyes are still hazy with the remnants of sleep. Aziraphale feels his ears warming up. How embarrassing. “How long have you been awake?” 

“Five forty three.” A look of horror flashes across Crowley’s features. “It’s fine. I always function with little sleep.” 

“As I said. Proper Dracula.” Crowley shifts around until he’s lying on his back. He scrubs a hand over his face, skin angry red to the tip of his ears and down his neck. “Listen, if… that happens again, kick me. I’m serious.”

Aziraphale knows there is no way he can convince Crowley that was more than fine, so he merely raises an eyebrow. The avoided meltdown is already a sounding success in his book. Time to shift the subject. “I have something for you.”

Crowley freezes with his hand over his cheeks. “Uh?” 

Aziraphale is already up, heading towards the walk-in closet. The staff unpacked their bags for them, but he’s pretty sure what he’s looking for is still in the secret compartment of his suitcase, where he purposefully left it. “Do you remember all those stores you dragged me to because you deemed my summer wardrobe unfit?”

It had been another impulsive decision. Aziraphale seems to be getting more comfortable with them, later. But when he saw the two things next to one another on that unassuming shelf in that even more bland shop he now cannot recall the name of, something started itching in him. He needed to buy them. So he did.

“I - you would have shown up in a 1960s vintage bathing suit.” Crowley’s voice sounds clearer now. “What are you doing?”

Aziraphale finds the hidden zip and lets out an excited sound. These are the perks of vintage luggage he’s always talking about. “I initially thought I could give this to you on Christmas Day, but you decided to wake up all grumpy today.”

“Oh, shut up.” 

Aziraphale ignores him, walking out of the closet with his treasures. “Ta-da!” 

Crowley is now sitting up against the headrest, and he’s glaring. “Absolutely not.” 

Aziraphale merely smiles wider. “Isn’t this absolutely darling?” 

“No.” Crowley shakes his head so fast his hair flies out in all directions. “Nope. Not happening. Forget about it.” The glaring intensifies. “Where did you even find that thing?” 

Still beaming, Aziraphale makes a beeline for the bed and sits back down in front of Crowley. “Right next to where I found mine!” With a giggle, he perches the straw hat on Crowley’s head. “I didn’t know they came in black, but when I saw it -”

There’s a pillow in his face. “Absolutely not. I am not wearing a straw hat.” 

Removing the pillow from his face, Aziraphale notices he’s wearing it now. “Oh, come on. We can match!” His own hat, a classic summer staple in the usual beige, is waiting for him on a shelf in the closet. It’s got a black band around the top, the reason Aziraphale selected that specific one over the million other options in the store. “Also, your skin is way too fair to parade around without a hat.”

“I can wear a normal hat. You know, the ones normal people wear.” Crowley points a finger to the hat still on his head. “One that doesn’t make me look like a goth pensioner.” 

“You look very fetching.” Aziraphale says. He flushes immediately. “The hat. It looks very fetching.” He bites his lip and feels his cheeks heat up even more. 

Crowley looks at him for a moment, cheeks still a bit pink from the whole… waking up debacle. “Is this seriously my Christmas present?” 

“Of course not.” Aziraphale waves a hand. “I hid that one way better.” It’s in yet another secret compartment. He does love his vintage luggages so much. 

As the silence drags on, he finds himself pouting. “If you hate it so -”

“Oh, shut it. You know damn well -” Crowley cuts himself off with a deep sigh. “I hate you. Thank you for the stupid hat, you seriously shouldn’t have.” 

Aziraphale smiles. “Does that mean you’ll wear it?” 

Crowley only glares some more. “I hate you. You’re a very evil person. Of course I will.” 

Embarrassingly, Aziraphale lets out another squeal, masking it with a cough and a neutrally pleased look. “Marvelous. I wouldn't want you to burn on the first day.” He points to the closet. “And I have a matching one.”

“So you’ve said.” Crowley deadpans. “As if my day could get any worse.” 

Aziraphale doesn’t remember when he started being able to read Crowley like a well loved book. He supposes it’s what ten years of steady friendship does to the relationship between two people, but the way he just knows how Crowley scrunches his nose just so is a dead giveaway of the smile he’s actually hiding is still… surprising. It is a nice surprise, being so in tune with another person’s moods and feelings, but it still is a bit … much. A lot to realise, a lot to think about. 

He gives Crowley a small smile. “So, we’ll head over to breakfast and then…”

Crowley falls back down on his mountains of pillows. The hat slides down his head to rest upon the slight crook of his nose, covering his eyes. “I’ll get us out of zumba, don’t you worry.”

“Do I…” Aziraphale drags his fingers on soft cotton. “Do I get the story now?” 

Crowley uses one finger to lift the hat above his eyes. “If you’re good, maybe later.” He ignores the way Aziraphale huffs and rolls his eyes as his mouth twitches up into a half smirk. “Now go and do your ten steps skincare routine or whatever. I need to get in character.” 

“How do you know about -” His words trail off, eyes narrowing where they’re watching Crowley. He knows. Of course he knows. How many other things has he noticed about Aziraphale, during the years? How many other things are synonymous with Aziraphale, in Crowley’s mind? The thought puts a weird tingle in his stomach. “It merely has six steps, actually.” 

Crowley’s half smirk blossoms into a full smile, his first of the morning. “Did you leave the face masks at home?” 

Aziraphale did, actually. He figured packing two different types of sunscreen was more important, especially since he knew Crowley wouldn’t even think of protecting his poor skin. 

He knew. How… exciting. That’s what this weird tingling is. He’s excited. Delighted. Almost giddy about it. “No comment,” he says to Crowley. “You’ll only be jealous of me when we’re old.” 

“We’re already old, angel.” The nickname is slipping into their private conversations more and more. Aziraphale ducks his head and smiles down at his hands every time he hears it. “Now shoo. I need to focus.” 

Aziraphale is closing the ensuite door, small smile still on his face, when Crowley speaks again. “Erm, Aziraphale?”

“Yes, dear?” 

“Thanks,” he says to one pillow, one pink cheek hidden by a hand scrubbing lightly at his morning scruff. “For - uhm, just thank you.” 

He’s not talking about the hat. Aziraphale knows. “Anytime.”

The flip flops have not disappeared overnight, despite Aziraphale’s most ardent wishes. They are proudly cladded around Crowley’s feet in all of their pink plastic glory. Today, the look is completed by a pair of boardshorts (black), a linen shirt (unsurprisingly black, though the golden buttons are a nice and surprising touch) and gold-rimmed sunglasses (Lord knows how many sunglasses Crowley packed). 

Aziraphale glances at his white linen trousers and light sage green shirt as they walk the small trail to the resort main lobby. They’re truly a study in contrasts. He has no idea how anyone could have bought their whole… charade, but it went surprisingly well the night before. 

“Wouldn’t have pegged you for a foot guy.” Crowley interrupts his thoughts with a little kick in Aziraphale’s shins. 

He rolls his eyes. “Perhaps if I think about it hard enough they’ll end up at the bottom of a volcano somewhere far away.”

Crowley barks a laugh and pulls the glass door open, letting Aziraphale in with a flourish of his hand. “You’re holding me back. Tampering with my self expression.” 

Aziraphale waits for him to shut the door before scanning the room. The space where they’re hosting breakfast is large and airy. He happily spots a buffet bursting with fresh fruits of all kinds and various pastries set up along both sides of the room. Round tables covered in white table cloths and decorated with bouquets of exotic flowers fill the rest of the floor space. 

Crowley whistles beside him. “How much budget do they have, exactly?”

“How would I know?” Aziraphale notices a glass sculpture depicting two flamingos at the end of the center of the buffet table. “Best not to question it.” 

“Good morning sirs!” A young woman wearing the resort uniform greets them with a smile. “May I have your names so I can escort you to your table?”

“Can’t we sit down wherever?” Crowley asks, as Aziraphale sighs. As if Gabriel would ever let them sit someplace he did not previously decide. 

“I’m afraid not, sir.” The woman keeps her polite smile in place. “The grooms have a rather strict sitting arrangement for all events.” 

“Nutters.” Crowley mumbles. Aziraphale takes one of his hands and squeezes. “Aziraphale Fell and Anthony Crowley, dear. Thank you very much.”

Their table turns out to be at the right of the grooms’ one, still - thankfully - empty. They’re sitting with the rest of Rory’s family, though only Anathema is currently present, pursuing the menu with a frown on her face. 

Crowley plops down with a frown, massaging his right hand. “Did you have to tore my ligaments on day one?” 

“Hush, darling,” Aziraphale raises his eyebrows in Anathema’s direction. “Say good morning to Anathema.” 

At the mention of her name, she looks up and eyes the both of them with raised eyebrows. “Oh, thank God. Hello.” She puts down the menu and her large black reading glasses. “Sorry for the bluntness, but I think you two are the only normal people in this whole wedding party. I’m glad Rory didn’t let me sit with one of those creepy looking cousins.” She grimaces in Aziraphale’s direction. “Sorry.” 

Crowley barks a laugh. “Nah, you’re right. One of them has a gold tooth.” He looks at Aziraphale. “She’s right. He’s the creepiest.” 

Aziraphale sighs. “That would be Sandy. The only time he saw my bookshop he asked me if I sold any pornography.” He shudders at the memory. Somehow, Crowley drops a spoon onto a delicate looking porcelain plate while Anathema laughs loudly. 

“Remind me to never interact with him, please,” she says. 

“I cannot believe you just said that out loud.” Crowley examines the plate for any crack. “At breakfast. Jesus.” 

Aziraphale is pretty surprised with himself as well, actually. There is just something about this place making him brutal with his honesty, apparently. “Apologies.” He pats Crowley’s hand lightly. “So, uhm, Anathema. Are you alone this morning?” 

“Ugh, Newt is useless when he’s jet lagged. He woke up at three in the morning, bothered me until I almost killed him with a pillow and then fell back asleep. Hasn’t woken up since.” She shrugs. “I think Granny is off flirting with some inappropriately young employee, while my parents are probably trying to avoid Granny being charged with sexual harassment.” She picks the menu back up, unbothered. 

Aziraphale raises both eyebrows. Crowley mumbles a cuckoo family in his ear. “Well. This should be a… fun wedding.” 

“I’m hoping you two will put on another show today.” She adds, not lifting her eyes. Aziraphale immediately blushes. “Seriously, it’s the only way I can survive this.”

He glances at Crowley, who’s looking back at him with raised eyebrows. He sees a corner of his mouth slowly, slowly lifting up. Trouble. It means trouble. 

“He’s not actually in the mob, despite what, erm, transpired.” Aziraphale blurts out. “And he doesn’t have a cat. Though there would be nothing wrong with owning a disabled pet, it would actually be a noble, precious -”

“Angel.” Crowley kicks him under the table. “Shut up.” 

“I figured.” Anathema smiles. “You’re both good people. I can see this kind of thing.”

Ah, right. Witches and auras. “Well, thank you then.” 

“You’re also fun, so please keep it up.” She rests her chin on one hand, menu forgotten. “Oh, and you’re the only couple in this party who actually love each other. Besides me and Newt, of course. I can also see that kind of thing.”

Aziraphale freezes. Crowley starts coughing, squirming in his seat and punching his own chest. 

It’s not - it’s not a revelation. Of course they love each other. They are best friends, for Heaven's sake.  Friends love each other, it’s normal and healthy and definitely not worth choking over or freezing up with a slight manic smile still in place. 

Aziraphale shakes himself and starts rubbing a soothing hand up and down Crowley’s back. He only coughs more. “That is, erm, that is a very nice thing to say.” Aziraphale raises his voice to be heard over Crowley’s choking sounds. “A very nice thing indeed.”

Anathema just laughs some more. 

A waiter comes up to the table and inquires about the breakfast specials. Aziraphale, who hasn’t even come close to thinking about picking up the menu, copies Anathema and orders the special artichoke omelet. 

Still a bit breathless, Crowley declines any special and mumbles something about the buffet. 

“Do you want some hot beverages with your breakfast?” 

“He’ll have a double espresso,” Aziraphale says. “Tea for me.”

“One splash of milk.” Crowley adds. “Bring sugar but don’t put it in.”

There’s the tingling again. Aziraphale rolls his lips not to smile too wide. “Precisely. Thank you.” 

He ignores Anathema’s knowing smile, focusing on something infinitely more pleasant. “Will you accompany me to the buffet, dear?” 

“Not a bloody promenade, Miss Bennet,” Crowley grumbles, already getting up and offering Aziraphale his hand. “I think I see those flaky pastries you like so much.” 

He does not squeal in reply, thank you very much. 

They indeed have a nice selection of flaky pastries, fresh and still warm. Aziraphale chooses a pain au chocolat and a buttery almond croissant that smell heavenly and look straight out of a parisian patisserie. Crowley declines any pastry, picking up a banana and some grapes before heading back to the table. 

Aziraphale frowns. He’s always after Crowley’s horrible eating habits: the man doesn’t know what a protein is and usually has more caffeine in his veins than red blood cells. He balances his pastry plate on his wrist while filling another one with a spoon of scrambled eggs and two slices of bacon. 

Crowley actually lifts up his glasses when Aziraphale places the plate in front of him. “Uh?”

“You need some protein,” he replies. “And the bacon is as crispy as you like it.” 

Crowley opens and closes his mouth. His eyes dart around the plate before boring into Aziraphale’s face. He’s frowning, as he usually is, but they’re soft. So soft. “Is the bacon smiling at me?” 

So what if Aziraphale artistically arranged Crowley’s breakfast? Feeding him is like feeding a toddler, after all. “Hush,” he smiles. “Don’t let it grow cold.”

He bites into his pain au chocolat. It’s warm, soft, deliciously buttery and not overbearingly sweet. Oh, it tastes just as perfect as it smelled like. He closes his eyes to lose himself in the swirling flavours, and he almost - almost - misses the shifting movements next to him. 

He doesn’t miss the sudden press of a pair of cold, dry lips on his cheek, quick as lightning. “Thanks.” Crowley awkwardly clears his throat, sunglasses back in place, and shuffles back to his own seat.  

Before Aziraphale can do something - choking, for example, and wasting a perfect pain au chocolat - the same waiter from before comes back with their drinks, and a carafe of orange juice for the whole table. Anathema immediately fills her glass, smiling at them above the rim. “My, my. Matching sparkles.” 

They both ignore her. 

Suddenly, the peaceful piano music in the background is replaced by the sounds of drums. From hidden doors behind the buffet table, two couples of dancers emerge in a swirl of orange, violet, blue and pink fabric. Aziraphale thinks the beat currently blasting is a rumba. The skirt of a dancer hits his back when she and her partner swirl around their table. 

“Christ on a bicycle.” Crowley mumbles. 

The drums pick up the tempo. The hidden doors open again and Gabriel and Rory enter the room, wearing matching yellow suits and meeting in the middle of the room in a… rather… passionate… embrace. 

“I should have poisoned him when we were ten.” Anathema comments. Aziraphale shares the sentiment. 

With a final crescendo, the cymbals stop and the dancers strike their final pose at opposite corners of the room. Gabriel dips Rory twice more before striking their very own final pose, which Aziraphale is pretty sure is copied from some ice dance performance, definitely more fitted for the Winter Olympics than Eden Resort. 

He swallows, throat dry, joining the timid claps of the rest of the guests. Crowley puts a hand on Aziraphale’s wrist and lowers his hands. “Don’t. Just - just don’t.”

“Hello!” Rory yells into a microphone. 

Various groans harmonize around the room. Crowley puts his napkin on his head. 

“Oops, sorry, amplified! I forgot,” he giggles. “Hello! Are you ready to kick off day one of the Roriel Fest?” He grins, not waiting for a reply - probably for the better. “Remember my beautiful flowers, food is fuel, and you’ll need your fuel for today’s adventures!” 

“Never a dull moment in Eden!” Gabriel adds. “Be ready to be amazed!”

“I’m ready to be euthanized.” Crowley mumbles. 

Aziraphale clenches his eyes shut, sipping his tea. “Beautiful flowers.” 

“Be grateful he didn’t start calling you with a flower name.” Anathema adds, smiling around her forkful of omelette. “I was Anthurium all throughout high school.” She glances over at her brother, now smooching Gabriel while ignoring a poor waiter trying to serve them orange juice. “I can’t believe I didn’t poison him.” 

Again, Aziraphale shares the sentiment. Thankfully, the same piano music from before fills the room again, and he can resume his breakfast in relative peace. The omelette special is as good as the pain au chocolat; if anything, the food in Eden is excellent. Crowley complains about his coffee not being strong enough, and orders another double espresso, ignoring Aziraphale’s pointedly raised eyebrows. 

Anathema’s husband makes his appearance a few moments after, looking just as unremarkable as he did the evening before, but with messier hair. “Sorry, sorry, hi.” He pants. “What did I miss?”

“Nothing babe,” Anathema shoves an empty plate in his hands. “Go get us some more of those french pastries, won’t you?” 

Crowley snorts as Newt obediently runs to the buffet table. Anathema grins. “He’s a good one.” 

Aziraphale returns her smile. “You too, my dear.” 

As Aziraphale discorvers shortly after, she’s a connoisseur of books, especially ancient prophecy ones, and they launch into a conversation rhythmically interrupted by Crowley’s groans and moans. “Of course you had to find the other book freak in the room.”

Aziraphale tuts. “Oh, hush darling. We met because of books. Specifically, old books.” 

“Oh, how did you meet?” Newts asks around a mouthful of eggs. He blushes immediately. “Sorry, can I ask? Sometimes I ask inappropriate questions and then Nath gets mad at me.” 

“Jesus Newt,” Anathema breathes. “Why would you say that?”

Aziraphale and Crowley exchange a glance. They knew this moment would come. They practiced for this. They know what to do, and that is just to embellish the truth a little bit. They can do this. He can do this. “It’s fine, dear. Not inappropriate at all.” 

“We met at a book fair. I attend them sometimes, for work.” 

Newt swallows. He probably still thinks Crowley is in some kind of criminal organisation. The dark glasses and the all-black outfit paired with the ever present frown now directed at him probably don’t help. Aziraphale clears his throat. “I hired him to find a book I thought was unfindable.” 

“Found it, obviously.” Crowley bumps their knees under the table. “He kept me around after that.” 

“We became friends. Best friends.” Aziraphale says. He can hear the fondness dripping in his voice, and doesn’t dare looking at Crowley. He takes a deep breath: this is the part where the truth stops and the embellishments begin; in his case, this is the part where he needs to voice something he only dreamed about out loud. “And after a while, well, I - I wanted something more.” 

He doesn’t remember the exact moment he started wanting something more. He thinks there wasn’t a specific moment in time, a triggering event, an epiphany of sorts. His affections for Crowley were there from the very beginning. They deepened little by little, gift after gift, bottle after a bottle. He was in the middle without knowing when it began. Absent-mindedly, he reaches over to take Crowley’s hand. “Luckily, he felt the same.”

“Luckily,” Crowley echoes, intertwining their fingers. “Yeah, luckily.” 

Anathema bumps Newt’s elbow. “See what I meant, babe? Sparkles.” 

Aziraphale feels the sparkles where their hands are joined. He doesn’t feel inclined to let go. When he dares to shift his gaze over to Crowley, he finds him looking down at their laced fingers, expression unreadable. How he loathes the damnable glasses. 

Whatever moment they were having is broken by none other than the grooms. “Our beautiful families!” Rory’s suit is a slightly darker yellow than Gabriel’s. The eerie matching smiles, however, are the same. “How are you all this fine morning?” 

“Mom and Dad are trying to keep Gran from assaulting someone.” Anathema says in lieu of a greeting. “Yellow is so not your colour.” 

Rory keeps grinning. Aziraphale doesn’t think he ever saw him doing something else with his face, besides the sobbing the night before. Well. At least he’s in touch with his emotions. “Annie, Mom said you had to be extra nice to me. It’s my wedding.” 

“Oh my God, seriously? Annie? How many times-”

“Aziraphale!” Gabriels interrupts. “I see you’re liking our pastries selection. We flew in a pastry chef from Paris.” He adds in a stage whisper. “I know they’re your favourites.” 

Aziraphale clenches his jaw so hard he feels his teeth clacking against each other. There’s a dig there, hidden behind the pleasant smile and the breathy giggle. Anyone would have missed it, but not Aziraphale. Not the person who grew up with Gabriel, not the person who knows all of his tactics and tricks. “They are, actually.” He puts a small piece of his almond croissant in his mouth, and chews happily. “Thank you so much, brother dearest.” 

Gabriel’s nose twitches. “You had an omelette, as well? Good for you.” 

Crowley drops his hand. Aziraphale panics for a moment, before noticing Crowley is using his newly freed hand to peel his banana. He puts half of it in his mouth, grinning at Gabriel and Rory. “Nife fuit, guys.” He swallows the banana almost without chewing. “I would be careful though. Lots of waiters, lots of liquids. Who knows what might happen.” 

He bites the other half of the banana, making a show of dropping the peel right on Gabriel’s feet. “Oh, sorry. See? Anything can happen. Clumsy hands.” 

Rory gingerly bends down to pick the discarded peel. “No trouble! Oh baby, I told you my suit was banana yellow! Look!” 

Aziraphale tugs Crowley closer with his hand and presses a kiss to his still banana-full cheek, ignoring the choking hazard. They’ve kissed twice more than they ever did just in an hour of being here. Perhaps this day won’t be as horrible as he previously thought. 

Crowley doesn’t choke. He swallows the mouthful, cheeks pink, and lifts a corner of his mouth. Aziraphale wants to kiss him again, if only to lift the other corner as well.

Gabriel gets Rory to stop rambling about different yellows and clears his throat. “So, we’ll see each other shortly at zumba?”

“Zumbaaaa!” Rory claps excitedly. “Our instructor comes directly from Brazil! Isn’t it exciting?”

“For fuck’s sake Rory, zumba is colombian.” Anathema says. “Can you at least try to learn something about your heritage?” 

Rory pouts. “But we’re Mexican, Annie.” 

“We are not - oh, whatever. Nice omelette, thank the chef for me.” 

Aziraphale reaches forward to pour her some more orange juice. She winks at him, and Aziraphale thinks he made a friend. 

“Actually, we are not attending zumba.” Crowley says, placing the napkin on his plate. “Sorry guys, we have a previous engagement.” 

Rory lets out a horrified gasp, while Gabriel merely freezes his smile in place. “Previous engagement? In the Maldives?” 

Aziraphale would like to ask the same questions, actually. He decides to just keep his mouth shut and busy with his tea. 

Crowley nods. “Yeah. One of my clients had to, well, leave London a few years back and fuck off to some exotic island to open a restaurant or whatever. You know, sometimes one needs a change of scenery.” He waves a hand. “And no extradition.”

Newt starts coughing. Aziraphale smiles into his tea. “Oh, poor Mikey.” 

Crowley snaps his fingers. “Yes, yes, Mikey. That was his name. Thanks angel.”

“I like him.” Aziraphale sighs wistfully. “Such a talented artist. Deeply misunderstood.” 

“Anyway,” Crowley continues. “Turns out, this is the island he fucked off to. Can you believe it?”

“Small world.” Anathema says, eyes twinkling. “So you decided to pay him a visit?”

“Oh, it was my fault.” Aziraphale deeply enjoys the way Gabriel’s jaw is twitching. “I forgot to tell Crowley about the schedule and he already made the call.” He squeezes Crowley’s bicep. “You know how I am. I’ll forget my own head next.” 

“Yeah, and the poor bastard only gets one call to and from England per month, you know how it is. So.” Crowley shrugs, downing the rest of the orange juice in his glass. “Sorry guys, no zumba.” 

Aziraphale beams. “We are devastated, of course. I hope you can forgive us.” 

There are two beats of silence. Crowley grins and bumps their knees again. Aziraphale finishes his tea and gently dabs his lips with the napkin. After another beat, Rory bends down and wraps his arms around the both of them, squeezing their heads together. “I’ll miss you so much, my brothers.” He smacks a kiss on each of their cheeks, for good measure. “So, so much.”

Aziraphale pats his hand. “You’re very sweet, Rory.” Crowley wipes his cheek with the napkin. 

Gabriel doesn’t say anything, jaw still twitching. His eyes (very blue, very cold, very different) stay focused on Aziraphale and he nods once before grabbing Rory’s hand. “Come on, baby. Let’s finish our greetings.” 

Crowley salutes them with two fingers. Aziraphale keeps looking at Gabriel even as they move away. His smile is so painfully fake. 

Some things never change. 

“I think this is the first time I’ve ever seen your ankles.” Crowley fixes the hat on top of his head, angling it down. “Or your knees.” 

“You told me to wear my bathing suit.” Aziraphale replies, smiling as he fixes his own, matching hat. “We never had a reason to see each other’s shins before.” 

Crowley lets out a few inarticulate sounds and walks faster. “Come on. We’re almost there.” 

Much to Aziraphale’s surprise, Crowley actually had a plan beyond the zumba lie. There is no mysterious asylum seeker friend involved, but there is a private beach, still managed by the resort, on the other side of the atoll.

“Apparently the nutters only rented half of the Resort for the Nutter Fest.” He’d said as they were changing in the bungalow. “The other half of it is populated by hopefully normal people.” 

He made a few calls and managed to reserve two spots at what Aziraphale has started to call The Other Beach in his head. Apparently, this Other Beach has a bar service as well, and Aziraphale is very excited about the cocktails. 

This side of the resort turns out to be just as pretty as their own. The beach club is a strip of white sand with various chaise longues artfully arranged, turquoise waves rolling lazily under the bluest sky Aziraphale can ever remember seeing. 

One employee comes up to them with a big smile. Everyone is always smiling in this place.

“Two seats under Crowley. I called this morning.”

The employee nods and leads the two to chaise longues one foot away from the rolling waves. Aziraphale takes the offered menu and begins to peruse it as Crowley leaves his horrifying shoes by his chaise and goes to dip his toes in the ocean. 

Aziraphale orders them both a frozen daiquiri, and inhales the sea salt air with a pleased smile on his face. To think there was a risk he would be sweating during zumba, right now. 

Crowley comes back with a spring in his step. “It’s still so warm,” he comments. “It’s unfairly pretty.”

Aziraphale hums, getting more comfortable on his chair. He digs around in his beach bag to retrieve his sun cream. “I ordered you a drink.” 

Crowley is checking something on his phone. “Oh?”

“Frozen daiquiri.” He unbuttons his shirt, carefully folding it on the top of his bag. “Banana. I believe it’s your favourite.” 

Crowley nods, not lifting his gaze. “Nailed it. Thanks.” 

Aziraphale rubs the cream into his skin, focusing on his collarbones and his underbelly. He always burns there, the most embarrassing of places to get sunburnt, and he particularly wants to avoid it this time, so he lathers double the amount of sunscreen he normally would use. With a final dab on his nose, he leans back and sighs contentedly, relaxing into the soft pillows under his back. “What a wonderful morning.” 

He’s met with silence. “What a marvelous beach.” He tries again. More silence. He cranes his neck to look at Crowley, who’s staring into nothing with his phone dangling precariously between his fingers. “Crowley? Is something the matter?” 

“Uhm. Nnh. N- yes. Yes. No, I mean. I’m fine.” Crowley shakes his head so fast his hat almost falls. “I’m - I’ll - nap! I’m taking a nap. Napping.” With that, he flops down on his chair, on his belly, phone discarded somewhere near his flip flops. 

Aziraphale raises his eyebrows. “Are you sure? It’s not even noon.”

“Never too early for a nap.” He cradles the small pillow meant for neck support  in his arms, smashing his face into it. “Night.”

“You still have your shirt on.” Aziraphale notices. “And your hat. And your sunglasses. You can’t be comfortable.” 

With a choked sound, Crowley lifts himself high enough to remove his shirt with one swift motion. He crumples it and throws it on top of his cotton tote bag, keeping both the glasses and the hat in place, plopping back down right after. “There. Happy?”

Oh, Aziraphale definitely is. “Do I need to put some sunscreen on your back?” 

“No.” He buries his face in the pillow again. “Goodnight.” 

“Don’t be silly.” Aziraphale tuts, squeezing some cream into his palm. “Your skin is very fair. I’ll be quick.” 

Ignoring Crowley’s weird sounds, he sits up and leans over Crowley’s back, rubbing the cream with gentle movement, squeezing the tense muscles of his back, and admiring the view. There’s a particular tension near Crowley’s shoulder. “My, you are very tight.” 

Crowley starts squirming, more muffled sounds coming from the pillow. Aziraphale moves down, digging his thumbs into the small of Crowley’s back. “Relax, my dear. And stay still for a second.” 

“Oh god, Aziraphale.” Crowley groans. “I’m all sunscreened. I promise, my skin is safe, thank you for your service.” 

Aziraphale ignores him and rubs some more cream onto his shoulders. “There. Now I’m done.” 

The same employee from before comes back with a tray and two identical drinks on it.

Crowley lifts himself up and downs his glass like a shot before Aziraphale can even say thank you. The waiter gives him a weird look, but Aziraphale merely smiles and waves him away with a soft thank you. 

“You are so weird sometimes, dear.” He chuckles, sipping his drink and relaxing back into his own chair. “Oh, this is so good.”

Crowley buries his face even deeper. “Goodnight.”  

Aziraphale ends up dozing off as well. He wakes up on his back, an open book on his stomach and his left arm bent over his head. The breeze gently ruffles the pages of the book, and he is pleased to note he’s not unbearably hot. His skin feels pleasantly warm, there’s only a bit of sweat pooling in the small of his back. 

“Crowley?” He calls out. 

“Mmh?”

Crowley is on his back as well, sipping on another drink, straw dangling from his mouth as he turns to look at Aziraphale. “Good morning princess.” 

He rolls his eyes. “How do you feel about a swim?” The ocean looks even calmer than it did in the morning, waves so gentle they’re basically caresses on the sand. 

“Lemme finish this one.” Crowley says, then proceeds to discard the straw and down the rest of his drink in one big gulp. “Alright. Let’s go.” 

Aziraphale shakes his head. “I do wonder about your sanity sometimes.” 

He gets up and extends one hand. Crowley looks at it for a moment, then removes his glasses and bolts towards the ocean. Aziraphale chuckles as he watches him launch himself into the water, face first, while he takes a much more calm approach and waddles around until the water reaches his waist. 

Crowley swims back up to him, flipping his hair back and rubbing a hand over his eyes. “Fucking fuck. It stings.” 

“Ah yes, the marvel of salt water.”

He gets a splash of salt water in his face for it, and he very maturely doesn’t reiterate. 

They float around for a bit in a comfortable silence, the warm, calm water lulling Aziraphale gently. He could doze again, if he closed his eyes. 

“What’s on the program tomorrow?” Crowley asks after a while.

Aziraphale thinks back at the glittery pamphlet. “Day Two, Pottery Pavillion.” He recites. “I’m afraid we’ll have to attend at least one activity per day if we don’t want to attract Gabriel’s wrath.” 

“I want to attract Gabriel’s wrath.” Crowley grins. “Bring it on. What are the most inappropriate shapes I can create in the Pottery Pavillion?” 

Aziraphale has to close his eyes when a vision of Crowley superimposed over Patrick Swayze floods his mind. “Phalluses.” Damn his mouth. “I mean, a few years back, I would have suggested phalluses. Now, however…” His words trail off, and he decides to card a hand through his hair, wetting his hair to hopefully cool down his brain. 

Crowley is laughing though, low and throaty. “Why does he always feel on the brink of committing a hate crime? He’s marrying a man.”

“Part of his general aura, I believe.” Aziraphale says. “You cannot take the homophobia out of the man, or something like that.” 

Crowley barks another laugh, loud and big mouthed. A mother with her kid throws a dirty look in their direction and swims further away. Aziraphale ignores her. He ignores pretty much everything else when Crowley is smiling, especially if it’s because of him. “How about… oh, what if I mock up the pottery class so badly the instructor has to kick me out?” 

Aziraphale giggles. “How would you even do it? It’s just clay.”

“Oh, angel. You don’t know half the things I can do with just clay.” Crowley grins and, great, Patrick Swayze is back. 

Aziraphale decides to submerge himself, lowering his knees until they touch the sand and squeezing his eyes shut, enjoying how cool the water feels on the heated skin of his face. He comes back up, laughing as he scrubs a hand over his eyes and the other one in his curls. “Oh dear, it does burn.” 

He expects another splash in retaliation, but it never comes. When he manages to open his eyes again, Crowley is staring at him, a small smile on his face. Aziraphale smiles back, feeling a bit of heat in his cheeks. 

“Your eyes are so blue,” he blurts out. His smile drops immediately. “I mean, they’re always blue. It’s not like they change - but they do actually sometimes, uhm, but not the point. It’s- they’re blue-er, here. In the water.” 

Now Aziraphale’s cheeks are definitely pink. “Oh. Thank you.” 

There are two more beats of silence. “Crowley?” Aziraphale threads the water with his hands and focuses his gaze on the movement of his fingers. “Do you think - have we got the same eyes? Me and Gabriel?” 

“No.” Crowley’s reply is as immediate as it is firm. “Absolutely not. Not a chance in hell. Not even close.” 

Aziraphale looks up, and smiles. Crowley smiles back. 

Eden Resort, Landaa Giraavaru, Maldives - 9 days before Christmas

Aziraphale scrubs his fingernails with a brush, squirting way more soap than necessary into his palms. The magic of cinema, making clay look dreamy and romantic when it is just, frankly, gross. 

“What a pretentious twat.” Crowley whispers beside him, aggressively scrubbing a particularly stubborn spot. “I can’t see the spirit, Anthony, where’s the spirit?” 

The pottery instructor, an eclectic looking woman named Marjorie, did not seem like Crowley’s biggest fan. “To be fair, it’s not like you put any real effort into it.” 

Aziraphale grins down at the suds-filled sink, recalling the sad lump of clay Crowley tried to call a vase. It looked more like a brick, to be completely honest. Crowley finishes scrubbing and splashes a few droplets on Aziraphale’s nose. “Apologies, teacher’s pet. Look at those perfect lines, Aziraphale!” 

Aziraphale’s creation is actually very pretty, and even has two smaller companion pieces he built with the remnants of Crowley’s monstrosity. He is actually proud of it, he even made arrangements with Marjorie to have it shipped to London. He’s always liked arts and crafts, growing up, and has always been somewhat good at it. For a few weeks, in another life, he debated with himself about actually doing something with this talent of his, but it never worked out. 

He never regretted it: books and literature are his life and his passion, but it was nice to get a bit creative again. “I’ll give the smallest pieces to you once we get back home,” he says to Crowley, drying his hand with a cloth who’s seen better days. 

“I’d actually make money if I sold them,” Crowley smiles at Aziraphale’s horrified gasp. “Not that I would. It was a compliment.” 

“Brothers!” Rory comes up between them and shoves his hands under the water. “That was beautiful. Wasn’t it beautiful? I felt so connected to Mother Earth, clay is so magical.” 

“Would love a bit less connection,” Crowley mumbles, drying the same spot from before with renewed vigour. 

Aziraphale looks around and over his shoulder to check for any sign of his brother, normally attached to Rory’s hip. 

“Gabey is knackered. He wanted to lie down a bit and felt like skipping lunch.” Rory says cheerfully. There’s a drop of clay on his cheek. “Can I join the two of you for lunch? We can eat fruits and get to know each other’s secrets!” 

Aziraphale immediately looks over at Crowley, who’s shaking his head fast enough to displace the sunglasses. “Erm.”

Rory’s eyes light up, leaning closer to Aziraphale and hiding his mouth behind a hand. “Also, Annie says it’s my turn to be on Gran Watch, but I don’t want to! It’s my wedding. I should spend the time getting to know my guests! Can I?”

Aziraphale sends a panicked glance Crowley’s way, who just keeps shaking his head. The glasses are now halfway down his nose, eyes wide behind them. “Oh, erm, well, actually-”

“Thank you!” Rory chirps and throws his arms around Aziraphale. Crowley lifts his arms and mouths a profanity. Aziraphale can only stand still. “I’ll go get us the prettiest table!” Rory adds drawing back, kissing Aziraphale’s cheek before running away. 

They watch him go in silence until they’re sure he’s out of earshot. “What the hell, Aziraphale?”

“Did you hear the word yes come out of my mouth, Crowley? Did you?” Aziraphale drags the heel of his hands over his eyes. “At least he’s not Gabriel.”

Crowley slams the cloth against the sink. “Alright, here’s what we’re doing.”

Aziraphale huffs, but Crowley ignores him. “You’ll order a fruit plate or whatever, you scarf it down in under five minutes, then I make up an headache and we bolt out of there, alright?” 

“Why do I need to order a fruit plate?” 

Crowley raises an eyebrow. “Because you love your little fruit plates. Especially when they include the green melon.” 

Well, he’s right. They’re incredibly refreshing, and the green melon is his favourite. Still, his face twists into a grimace. “I do not think I’m able to survive a conversation with Rory Device soon to be Fell.” 

“Wanna know what’s worse?” Crowley fixes his glasses and the cuffs of his faded grey t-shirt (a new colour - Aziraphale dropped his comb this morning upon seeing it for the first time). “Zumba. Remember we survived zumba day without actually participating. Let’s go.” 

That makes Aziraphale crack a small smile. “And you still did not tell me the full story.” 

Crowley drags him away by his wrist. “Come on. Five minutes start now.” 

Rory is already sitting down at the supposedly prettiest table at the resort's beach restaurant, a tiny one right at the end of the dock, overseeing the shore. Obviously, he’s waving with both hands and grinning like a maniac. With a quick glance around the room, Aziraphale spots Anathema having a heated conversation with her mother, Newt vibrating beside her, and Muriel reading a book while the rest of their cousins argue about something at another table.

He still hasn’t checked in with her, and he needs to do it. He’s just being a bit too focused on… other things. Namely, the hand now giving his own clammy one a squeeze. 

“I ordered us some bubbles!” Rory says as soon as they sit down. 

“Thank you,” Aziraphale replies politely. “You shouldn’t have.”

“Really.” Crowley mumbles. Aziraphale kicks him. 

“So!” Rory claps his hands and giggles excitedly. “Are you having fun? Is Eden Resort everything you thought it would be?”

Aziraphale didn’t actually have much expectations before coming here. His brain was just in survival mode, and he didn’t actually hope to enjoy himself. 

He should have known better. He looks at Crowley for a moment and smiles before turning back to Rory. “It’s been fun. This place is wonderful, truly.” 

Rory looks elated. “I’ve looked for the perfect place for so long, you have no idea. I’ve been so worried it wouldn’t be up to anyone’s standards but it’s been good right? It’s pretty and everyone looks happy. I hope it-”

The waiter comes up to their table with the bottle Rory ordered and cuts off his ramble. Aziraphale exhales through his nose, a smile still plastered on his face, and sends a prayer vaguely upwards to ensure Rory stops talking at least while eating. 

They order matching fruit plates, Crowley waving down the waiter to ask for extra green melon on one of them. Aziraphale’s belly tingles again. (The tingles have been pretty much non-stop til the first breakfast, but somehow they only grow stronger, harder to ignore, even harder to hide.) He reaches over and squeezes Crowley’s wrist, trying not to give in to temptation and press a kiss on his barely lifted cheekbone.

His trance is broken by a sniff on the other end of the table. Rory is dabbing under his eyes with his pristine napkin. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” he breathes out. “It’s just just - I’m absorbing so much love I don’t know where to put it. My - my soul feels a bit unbalanced.” 

Crowley squirms and reaches over to the bottle to top off Rory’s glass. “Here. Bubbles help.” 

Aziraphale downs his own glass. “It is a, uhm, very romantic setting.”

There are thin veiled sheets flowing around the veranda where they’re currently sitting, and a bouquet of white lilies and baby’s breath on each table. The light blue sky and turquoise sea in the background add to the scenery. 

“Yes, yes, it is. I love what they did with my vision and I’m glad the lilies could be shipped here in time. God knows what I would have done with anemone.” Rory sighs wistfully. “But it’s actually you two. I can’t look at you without overflowing.”

Aziraphale puts down his glass. Crowley tops it off and adds some more champagne in his already full one, throwing it down in a single gulp. “Thanks.” He says. 

“You have no idea - oh, look, I’m tearing up again.” He dabs his eyes with the other hand of his napkin. “I’m just so glad fate brought you to me.”

“More Emirates Airlines’ doing, but thanks.” Crowley says, pouring himself another glass. “Cheers.” 

Rory blinks at him for a few seconds before dissolving in a loud, open mouthed laugh. “He’s funny, Aziraphale! He’s funny, you lucky puppy.” 

As soon as his plate is placed in front of him, he pops a grape into his mouth, hoping the sweetness will make him forget the words lucky puppy uttered in his direction. 

Crowley puts the extra green melon on his plate and he has to take a moment to drown the tingles with more bubbles. What a lunch. 

“I’m so glad I’m getting married.” Rory says, apropos of nothing. “I know we didn’t have a conventional beginning, but as soon as I saw him… I just knew, you know? I had this feeling in my chest that he was the one.” Leaning forward on the table, he takes one of Aziraphale’s hands into his own. “Gabriel and I are becoming a family, and you’re part of it as well. I’m so glad you’re part of my family, Aziraphale, and I hope you like me.” 

Good Lord. 

Aziraphale is used to feeling annoyed by his future brother in law by now, and that is definitely the most popular of his feelings right now. But there’s also something about those shiny brown eyes and that unwavering smile that lets him know how - unfortunately - sincere Rory is being. 

And that is - that makes Aziraphale think about his brother, the best liar he’s ever known, the man Rory is marrying. It makes him slightly uneasy, and it is that uneasiness which makes him smile at Rory. “You seem like a very kind person,” he chooses to say. “We’ll be fine, I’m sure.” 

It’s enough for now, as the beaming smile is back and even a giggle. Rory seems happy to dive into a rant about fruits and vitamins, while Aziraphale struggles to focus. 

Gabriel is not a kind person, nor is he sincere. And Rory may be annoying and weird and definitely not a good therapist, but Aziraphale thinks there’s a certain genuinity to him that Gabriel misses and, frankly, does not deserve. 

It’s not his business, actually. He should just forget about it. He bites into a piece of cantaloupe and tries to swallow down the sudden sadness. 

Rory cuts himself off mid ramble about the properties of pineapple to point a finger at Aziraphale. “Oh! I’ve been meaning to ask you for ages!” He even puts down his fork. “Is your hair real?” 

Aziraphale doesn’t know whether he is more offended by the question or by how Crowley immediately starts laughing. No, actually, he’s guffawing; he’s loud and boisterous, spitting bits of mango in his napkin and bumping the table with his knees with how hard is shaking. 

He takes a moment to dab his lips before carefully folding the napkin in his lap. “Yes, Rory, I’m afraid it is. Before you ask, no, I do not know where it came from either.”

Given the short duration of his parents’ marriage and he and Gabriel’s age difference, he’s always had suspicions, but that is a whole different story. 

“I knew it!” Rory says, loud enough to be heard over Crowley’s snickers. Aziraphale kicks him hard enough to shut him up. “It’s just so - bouncy. And full, as well. Bleach doesn’t do that, you know I went through a phase a few years back -”

“Yes, I’m lucky enough.” Aziraphale subconsciously runs a hand through his slightly flattened curls. 

“Blond curls, blue eyes. Aren’t you dreamy?” Rory winks, plopping a grape into his mouth. 

Crowley sits up straighter, and that makes Aziraphale laugh. “Why, thank you.”

“So,” Crowley clanks his fork against his plate, making a few heads turn in their direction. “Excited about getting married? To Aziraphale’s brother?” 

Aziraphale smiles down at his plate, while Rory launches himself into a rant about wedding vows and doves and butterflies, of all things. Crowley oohs and aahs at the right times, while making a show of playing with Aziraphale’s fingers, throwing an arm around his shoulder, even obnoxiously fluffing up his hair at one point. 

Ridiculous. It’s all absolutely ridiculous and Aziraphale needs more champagne. Possibly a whole other bottle of it, but he settles with one more glass. 

“Sirs? Would you like anything else?” The same waiter from before asks as the table is getting cleaned. 

“No!” Aziraphale decides, making an executive decision. He uses the hand Crowley has now wrapped around his waist to hoist him with him as well. “This has been a delightful lunch, Rory, thank you so much.”

Rory’s big brown eyes blink at him confusedly. “Are you going already? I was just getting to the good part of the florist tale-”

“Headaches!” Aziraphale folds his used napkin on the table, because he’s always anything but impolite. “You know how it is, all this… sun and excitement! Not as young as I used to be!, I’m sure you know the feeling.”

Concern washes over Rory’s face. “Do you need something? Advil? Are you skipping Arts and Crafts this afternoon? I have a stash of homegrown in my nightstand if you want to -”
“Thanks, bye!” Crowley drags him out again, as it’s become his habit. Aziraphale doesn’t think he minds. 

Dinner that night is accompanied by the ocean themed movie marathon. 

The wedding party is spread out over picnic tables spread on the sand, tiki torches lit around the perimeter of the space. On a large stage, a screen just shy of being as big as a cinema one is currently projecting Titanic - which wouldn’t have been Aziraphale’s first choice in ocean themed movies to play during a wedding, but it’s not his wedding, so he lets it go. 

Since it's not his wedding, he also doesn’t look over at Rory and Gabriel and he certainly doesn’t focus on his brother’s eyes as he watches his groom talk. He merely lets it go. 

“Fancy some popcorn?” Crowley says, stretching his arms over his head and pointing at the little stand beside a tiki torch. “Apparently there is more than one flavour. I want to see what the nutters could have possibly come up with.” 

Aziraphale pats his belly, tugging the hem of his baby pink shirt down - another one of Crowley's choices he doesn’t really mind. “I don’t think I can take another bite.” Dinner was a barbecue: guests were served kobe beef hot dogs and wagyu burgers and Crowley, long time meat-hater, only had a lobster tail. “You go and have a look dear. It’s not like you’ll miss much.” He gestures at the screen, where Jack is currently painting Rose like one of his French girls. 

Grimacing at the screen, Crowley slowly gets up and hops to the popcorn stand. Aziraphale watches him as he frowns over the selection, enjoying the way he glares at everyone who talks to him without even meaning to. 

He left the glasses in the room for once, which means Aziraphale can take his fill of his expressive face properly, drink in the way his deep brown eyes warm up in the gentle light of the sunset, slightly tanned skin emphasized by the gold seams in his shirt. 

He jumps as someone sits down on the bench next to him, engrossed as he is in his ogling. 

“Hello, hello, hello.”

Aziraphale smiles, genuinely for once. “Oh, Muriel. How are you?” 

“I’m good. I don’t think I’ve ever spent so much time doing nothing.” She looks down at her hands, stained with some blue material Aziraphale is thankful he doesn’t know the origin of. “Well, apart from Rory and Gabriel’s activities. They planned so much, didn’t they? I wouldn’t even have half of these ideas.” 

They skipped Arts and Crafts for a headache induced nap which actually was another visit to what Aziraphale has started to think of as ‘their’ beach. He smiles at Muriel. “No, dear, me either. They certainly are… original.” 

She smiles, taking a sip of her drink. “It’s been so long since we last saw you! What have you, uhm, been up to?” 

With a soft smile, he looks over to their cousins’ table, where Sandy does a poor job of looking away at the last second. “Were you sent over here to investigate?” 

Muriel’s face drops immediately. “I’m sorry! Aziraphale, I’m sorry, I didn’t really want to, but then Michael started saying all those things and Sandy is being so mean and Sarah just sighs and nods at random times and I really, really wanted to talk to you but -”

“Muriel, dear, it’s fine, take a deep breath.” Aziraphale puts a placating hand on her back. “I know how it is, no apologies needed.” He looks over at Sandy and waves when he finds him looking back. “What did you want to tell me?” 

Muriel needs to take another sip of her pink drink before replying. When she does, she doesn’t ask a question. “You look happier. He makes you laugh a lot, doesn’t he? I - I don’t think he’s as bad as Michael says.” 

Instinctively, Aziraphale looks over at Crowley, now heading back with two popcorn bowls awkwardly balanced in his arms. “People who love you should make you happy.” Muriel says beside him. 

He squeezes her shoulder. “You are so right.” 

“Bloody fucking hell.” Crowley launches himself in his seat, popcorn flying everywhere on the table and few shushing sounds coming from the neighbour's table. “Of course they couldn’t have named them normally. What on Earth is Rory's Afternoon Delight and why the hell would I want to know about - oh. Hi.” 

Muriel offers him a timid wave. “Hello hello. I’m Muriel, Aziraphale’s cousin.” 

“I know, he told me about you.” Crowley offers her the pink bowl, glancing at her drink. “Want some? They’re cherry flavoured.” 

Aziraphale loves him. Again, it’s old news, but he does. Crowley trusts his judgement enough to drop the rudeness and the cover of his aloof persona just because he told him Muriel is a good egg. As he watches Muriel smile and take the offered pink corn, he just loves him more. 

“Will you stay with us for this movie?” He asks Muriel. “You’ll just say you’re gathering some more information.” 

Crowley’s eyebrows shoot up immediately, but Aziraphale crosses their ankles together and shakes his head. Muriel beams, clearly excited. “Oh, could I? I mean - it’s not like I’m bored or -”

“Please, do stay. And tell me everything I missed about your doctorate.” 

None of them pays attention to the rest of the movie. Muriel happily babbles on about anthropology and academic fundings, Aziraphale divides his focus between her and all the point his skin and Crowley’s are touching, while Crowley silently listens to the conversation, cutting in to ask Muriel a question about the ethics of smell in literature and smiling at Aziraphale when she gets so excited she squeals, prompting more shushing sounds. 

Aziraphale merely loves him more. 

He only notices when the movie’s over because Gabriel’s voice suddenly disrupts the quiet of the beach. “Well, it’s a classic for a reason, isn’t it my lovely guests?” He laughs into his microphone. “Now, for our next movie, you may want to suspend your judgement and just open your heart. I did as well, only because I love my Rory-cakes so much -”

He doesn’t get to finish the sentence because Rory runs up to the stage and crashes into Gabriel. “I thought you vetoed Finding Nemo!” He yells, then proceeds to snog him as if his parents and Grandmother aren’t sitting at the table in front of them. To be fair, Gran is cheering, so everything must be right. 

Crowley drags his attention back to his own table tapping two fingers on the back of his hand. “I am vetoing Finding Nemo.” 

Aziraphale nods. “You and me both.” 

Muriel hugs him goodnight, whispering, “He’s really not bad,” in his ear before reuniting with the rest of his family. If Crowley notices his pinkening cheeks, he doesn’t say anything, merely waving a hand in Muriel’s direction. 

They head back towards their bungalows without saying bye to anyone else, Aziraphale giggling as Crowley recalls the weird popcorn names he unfortunately memorised. 

Inside, they both head for the en suite, Crowley eyeing the long row of products on the countertop. “Do you seriously need all that?”

“I have a routine,” Aziraphale replies, unclasping his detergent and dropping a dollop on his palm. 

Crowley splashes some water on his face. “This is mine. Done.”

Aziraphale ignores him as he follows his usual step. He rubs moisturizer onto his skin with rhythmic circular motions, enjoying the pleasant flowery smell.

Crowley spits toothpaste in the sink and rinses his mouth with a loud gargle. “Right. Have fun, I’ll be in bed.” 

Aziraphale only has two steps left: eye cream, even though he did not escape the genetic curse of crow’s feet, and hand lotion, because the sand dries his knuckles terribly. 

He’s still massaging the almond smelling cream into his palms as he steps out of the bathroom and finds Crowley building a pillow forth in the middle of the bed. He rolls his eyes. 

He tried to convince him it’s absolutely not necessarily the night before, to no avail. Tonight, he’s loving him a bit too much to put up with it. 

Unceremoniously, he hops on the bed and drops the pillow to the ground. 

Crowley freezes with a smaller pillow in his hand. “What are you doing?” 

“Acting my age.” Aziraphale pulls the duvet all the way to his chin, humming contentedly at the cold cotton hitting his warmed up skin. “Turn off the light and go to sleep.” 

“But, Aziraphale-”

“Anthony. Turn off the light and go to sleep.” 

It takes him a full minute to actually comply, but in the end he drops the pillow and plunges the room into semi-darkness, moonlight blaring into their room through the glass patio door. He settles on his stomach with his arms under his head. “You’re not my boss.”

“Of course.” Aziraphale sighs, shifting around to get properly comfortable. “I had a weird thought today.” 

Crowley barks a laugh. “Ground breaking news.” 

“Well, goodnight then.” Aziraphale turns onto his side, giving Crowley his back. “Sweet dreams.”

“Come on, it was a joke.” Crowley says, smile clear in his words. “Tell us your weird thought.” 

“Enough chit chat. Goodnight.” 

“Drama queen.” He hears Crowley whisper. A foot pokes his own repeatedly under the cover. “I am way more annoying than you are, remember that.”

With a huff, Aziraphale rolls back in his previous position and angles his face towards Crowley. “I felt sad for Rory Device.” 

Crowley rubs his cheek on his pillow. “Because he’s marrying your awful brother?” 

“He’s way less awful than Gabriel.” Aziraphale continues. “He’s weird, I’ll give you that, but he is also… sincere.” 

Crowley exhales deeply, pushing hot air out of his nostrils. “Two thoughts,” he says, freeing one arm to hold up two fingers. “One, he’s not just weird, he is completely batshit. But he’s also old enough to make his own decisions.”

“I didn’t say that.” 

Crowley shushes him. “That said, I guess I could feel bad for him too. I mean, Gabriel is awful. With that evil glint in his eye and all that botox in his forehead.” 

Aziraphale breathes out a laugh. Seeing the way Gabriel’s face twitches in annoyance is even funnier now that he can’t move his eyebrows properly. “And the second thing?” 

Crowley puts his free hand on Aziraphale’s shoulder, lightly thumbing his collarbone, and everything tingles. “You’re too good for the lot of ‘em.” 

They hold each other’s gazes for a while, pale moonlight shining on the cheekbones Aziraphale so desperately wants to touch. Before he can do anything about it, Crowley drops his hand and turns to the other side, angling his face away. “Night then,” he mumbles. 

Aziraphale looks at the back of his head for a moment before staring at the ceiling. “Dream of whatever you like best, darling.”

He never dreams, but knows what he would dream about if he could.