diatu | Demontoberfest

The wickedly, rude, Mr. Crowley who only shows up for three-fourths of his classes but still manages to pass his pop quizzes was dancing. Sort of. It was more of a shimmy as he waited at the bar to collect a fresh drink for himself and a few ever so sinful cream puffs from the bartender.

"Green? Ohm, it does that."

He barely looked at his purchases before snatching them all up and plopping the whole lot down in front of Aziraphale.

"You're drunk!" He ever so helpfully and equally drunkenly replied, "I've never heard you say anything like that before. It was all... get thee behind me Satan and--"

And I'm an angel you are a demon, its over... That he wisely chose to forget he had ever heard even if it had resurfaced long enough to stab at him again.

"Heretical enemies!"

Crowley stared down into his glass as it too turned green.

"This must be really good stuff."

Edited 2021-09-11 05:51 (UTC)

"Not drunk enough to agree that this is good." A pause, and then he gave careful consideration of a person who was a bit drunk and realizing he was at a demon party, so things really shouldn't be 'good,' exactly. "Or wicked." He put the drink aside (it wasn't bad, the angel just was picky) and, with a raise of his brows, silently asked may I? about the newly arrived dessert.

"Though I suppose the drink isn't the only one who can change his--its--their--colors. Colors? Stripes? Stripes, but it's not striped." How dare it not be striped. "I told you, Crowley, we're friends."

The plater of cream puffs was sitting right there in the middle of the table. Crowley wasn't going to say a thing if any of the treats disappeared and gestured in a 'help yourself' manner to indicate as much. Acting as a temptation for a certain angel was the only reason they had been ordered in the first place. He meanwhile was quite content with his green, nay... now red drink, for the moment unaware of there being any side effects.

"Yea, friends, of course we're friends."

Friends. For some reason hearing that word sent him back into his glass for a long swig.

"You're my best friend. Always have been..."

And more than that. If he were truthful and open about his feelings, there had always been more than that too. Aziraphale could turn a shitty day around, make him laugh, give him some one to confide in, spent time with... If only all those feelings could be shown.

"We should dance."

He wiggled and picked up one of the cream puffs, savoring a slow bite of it along with Crowley's words. Best Friends. Sure, he was utterly in love with this ridiculous demon, but every time they discussed--or at least finally put into words--that they were best friends it brought him such joy. Six millennia of trying to deny it and now he could openly acknowledge that, in so many ways, Crowley had inspired him to laugh and grow as a person, brought meaning to all things great and small. He had thought he was in love when they had been humans, but how truly lacking that feeling had been. What they shared as themselves was so much more complex--

The suggestion caught him off guard. Dance here? This was hardly the kind of place for any of the dances Aziraphale was trained in. Surely Crowley had to realize this was not, as the children say, his type of scene.

With a snap, the plate of desserts vanished to someplace safe for later snacking and he met Crowley's gaze as he finished off the cream puff and wiped his fingers on a napkin.

"Perhaps you ought to ask me, then."

Crowley had his arguments all lined up. 'Dance here?' Aziraphale would say and Crowley would come at him with a, 'Why not? I thought drinks weren't the only ones who could change their colors.' Calling out what the angel had just said would throw his game off. Then he would stand up, extend a hand, and offer to show Aziraphale how to do the slither. After a few thousand years on Earth he could stand to learn more than just the one dance.

Only this wasn't what happened at all and it was Crowley's game that was thrown off. Aziraphale was accepting a dance without having his wing twisted or needing to be persuaded into it? All he had to do was ask? It sounded far too good to be true and he approached the asking with all the due suspicion it deserved, like if he handled this with anything other than the most gentle of touches the dream might burst and he would find himself sitting here alone with his drink. Speaking as softly as one might to a newborn kitten he held out a hand.

"Care to dance, Angel?"

Drinks weren't the only things that could change their colors, after all.

Crowley was so sweet, so soft with him, not the usual bravado and temptation. It was charmingly fragile, whatever this mood was, and he wished he could forego the dancing altogether and take Crowley somewhere quieter, where there wasn't strange loud music and other people. Where the glasses might even come off.

He placed his hand in Crowley's. "With you? I thought you'd never ask." As he pushed out his chair and stood, he gave a little wiggle of delight and playfully asked, "Do you think your record-jockey will take requests? I'm not sure we can gavotte to this."

Record-jockey! This was now not the 80s. That was a DJ and the tunes he was dishing out were all being magically created through some swishy-swashy wand slinging that Crowley couldn't even begin to understand.

Not that he could say any of that. The words had been taken when his hand was. Soft, the hands of a bookman's that have been carefully maintained in order to protect his precious pages, and warm, far warmer than he had ever dreamed it could have been.

"This isn't the sort of music you gavotte to, Angel."

With him. The music paled around them, suddenly feeling like it was the wrong pace. The tempo was too fast, the lyrics conveyed the wrong feeling. But his DJ did take requests and a snap of the fingers soon had a new song title sitting in front of the able record-jockey.

"You dance like this."

The hand holding his was given a little tug, pulling Aziraphale in close enough so that Crowley's other hand could rest snuggly upon the small of his back. The Waltz had never been something he had spent a great time learning but one could sway gently to the beat of the music, even risk leaning in nearer to his friend's ear... everyone was drunk by now anyway, no one would notice.

Thousands of years, multitudes of universes and memories, kisses and much more--and simply being close to Crowley still left Aziraphale weak at the knees. He was drunk on the moment as Crowley led them away from their table to dance. The music could have been anything--even that ridiculous ukulele cacophony--and Aziraphale would have tolerated it to enjoy a dance with his demon.

But as the music shifted, he took note of a familiar vocalist. Ah, Queen. Of course.

He'd had plans to tell Crowley his feelings, eventually, but had gotten rather hung up on figuring out how best to court him. Crowley deserved a proper courtship, but it seemed the universe had ways of making things happen regardless of plans; he and Crowley had always circled each other like hopelessly enamored celestial bodies, drawn closer by their combined gravity. And here they were again, unable to keep from each other's orbit.

He welcomed being drawn in, all glowing smiles and no shyness, and cradled Crowley's shoulders in his own embrace as they swayed mostly, somewhat, in time with the music. His friend's breath was warm against his cheek, a wordless temptation he was fairly sure at first that Crowley didn't intend.

But the words of the song, which Aziraphale couldn't recall ever properly hearing before now, were undisputedly romantic, a plea by the singer for his love to look and see, to understand that everything they do takes the singer's breath away. In another lifetime he could have pretended he didn't hear--they were very good at that.

Don't leave me here all by myself
I get ever so lonely from time to time
I will find you
Anywhere you go, I'll be right behind you
Right until the ends of the earth

"I want you beside me, always."

It was a trick of the dance, an illusion brought on by the heavy drinking, the dim mood lighting, and the yearning song. He had secretly hoped Aziraphale would take notice and wish to stay by his side as much as he wished to stay by his Angel's but it wasn't likely to happen. He couldn't say how he felt, truly he wasn't even sure his mouth could form the words, and Aziraphale had always had very good reasons for keeping his sinful self at wing's length.

The dance had made them both as giddy as the drink had, making them think the the wild impossible was actually possible. It was foolish. As foolish as picking that one song out of the dozens of Queen melodies he could have chosen! It was stupid! Some how his drink addled mind had picked the one song that left little doubt as to his true feelings.

And yet still, he stayed with the dance. Wanting to pretend for just that little bit longer that this was actually real.

"You're drunk Angel. Probably as drunk as I am."

Wasn't that all it was?

"So?" Really, Crowley was ruining a perfectly lovely moment by reminding him he was drunk. If he'd wanted someone to police his good time, he would have invited Alec to play overbearing chaperone, or stayed at the party at the Temples. What did being drunk have to do with his undying affection for his demonic best friend? Some of their best times together went along with a glass of wine or a pint of mead. He pulled back to watch Crowley properly as they spoke. "I've been drunk plenty of times and it hasn't stopped us from having very honest conversations, I think. Dare I say sometimes blasphemly--" The word tied his tongue and he frowned and tried again, perturbed that it might be supporting Crowley's argument. "Blasphemously honest."

On both sides, really. They'd had their secrets, naturally they'd kept secrets, but they had also divulged entirely too much about their opinions, respective missions and head offices to be wholly kosher.

"Of course if you don't want me to say such things, I won't," he promised and gave a coy shrug. "At least not where you might hear."

"I don't want you to say anything you'll regret... Something you will have to take back in the morning."

To be reminded tomorrow that he was a demon and Aziraphale was an angel, there would always be a dividing line between them. Or worse, that he had moved too fast, that his company needed to be withdrawn for a few centuries when in actuality he would give anything to hear Aziraphale say, 'I want you beside me, always' again. They had just graduated to friends, best friends, and nothing should compromise that!

Demontoberfest

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