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May. 16th, 2006 11:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nnyIn which I discover how much of a bastard Aziraphael can be, and I hate it. Sequel to Pinboard.
He's received a number of polite postcards from Aziraphael. He keeps them seperately, filed in date order, in a box under his bed. Sometimes he takes them out to look at them, but less and less frequently these days.
'Time to think' is on a different scale when you're six thousand years old.
Postcard 1 (three weeks): Gondolas. Aziraphael still loves Italy, there's no escaping it, but the associations with Rome aren't what they used to be.
My dear,
the weather is lovely enough that I'm reduced to talking about it quite against my will. I'm spending a lot of time sitting in the shade with books heavy enough to be glad I needn't worry about hand luggage allowance and to be frustrated I chose to carry them.
And just so you're aware, you distract me, even when you're not here.
Give my love to everyone, and make them jealous with thoughts of how terribly tanned I could be getting, were I fool enough to go out in the midday sun.
Aziraphael.
The first time Aziraphael comes back, Crowley doesn't even hear about it until afterwards. He nods, collected and calm, and inspires a fight in the bar which is against all the rules because he can't keep listening to 'Dora say sorry.
It's okay, anyway - there's no one around to make him feel bad for it.
Postcard 2 (two months): A picture of the Eiffel tower. The caption says 'I lied when I said I was going to Scotland'.
Crowley, my dear,
The weather is awful and my books are quite damp. Much of my time is spent gazing dolefully out of windows and counting bedraggled sheep in a bid to fall asleep; it would save me from thinking about all the things I promised I would. I don't know if I'll be back as soon as I'd hoped. There's a lot of world to go looking through for answers and I'm not even sure I know the questions, yet.
I miss you.
- A
The second time, Bernard tells him first.
He falls asleep on the sofa in the back room and he wakes up cold, with a crick in his neck and no sound in the shop save for the gentle pattering of the kind of dispiriting rain it's never quite worth putting up an umbrella for. It's a fucking miserable walk home; a woman slips over and ruins her new blouse, there's a car crash not bad enough to do much more than rattle nerves and cause a fight that manages to involve far more passers by than it ought, and none of it makes him feel any better.
And then he sees the pale yellow post-it stuck to his fridge.
I'm sorry. I can't, not yet.
And Crowley leans back against the door frame and covers his mouth with one hand and laughs and laughs and hates.
Postcard 3 (seven and a half months): Quint Buchholz's Mann auf einer Leiter
Crowley -
I'd forgotten how big the world is. And such people in't! Some places rival Milliways, believe it or not; although there are, of course, important omissions.
Please give my love to everyone. I'll visit, soon.
I wish you were here.
- A.
It's dark and the grass is cold, tickling against the back of his neck, and even the Atlantean can't drown out the laughter and the rise and fall of voices and Aziraphael has to know he's out here, that's maybe the worst of it -
(And you look me in the eye and make another remark about 'one way' with a straight face)
- and Crowley takes another swig of wine and watches the stars whirl around his head.
He doesn't even notice, for a while, that he's being watched. And then he grins, and says "hey, thanks for the postcard," and Raguel's eyes are unreadable in the moonlight.
A particularly loud burst of laughter makes him wince, a little, but sunglasses hide a multitude of sins and the (other) angel doesn't say a word, doesn't try to come up with something to say, just closes his hand around the wine like he knows how Crowley feels.
The taste of the angel's mouth on the neck of the bottle is warm against the night air, and familiar enough to make it feel natural when he curls his hand around the back of Raguel's neck and pulls him down.
And some low dark voice in the back of his head hopes that Aziraphael can feel it.
Postcard 4: A duck perched on a KEEP OFF sign (seven and three quarter months)
Congratulations.
- A
"'Dora told you?"
Aziraphael turns away from the lake and smiles, that old familiar smile that has Crowley clenching his fists at his sides.
"I didn't think you'd come."
"Of course I came, you bastard."
"Really, my dear."
Crowley sees red. He grabs Aziraphael by the lapels, tweed scratching against white-knuckled fingers, and in a second he's got him pushed up - hard - against the nearest tree. Slashes of colour across the angel's cheekbones and for a second he bends his head a little, and for a second it almost looks like he might...
No.
"Yes, 'Dora told me." And he's so calm about it, and there's a deep and bloody accepting look of sadness in his blue eyes and just once Crowley wants him to fight for something. To let him know that he's worth that.
And Crowley thinks, I hate you. And he leans forward, crosses the distance that Aziraphael won't, presses him back against the tree and kisses him.
It takes him a moment or two to realise that Aziraphael's hands, curled around his, are trying to push him away.
"You should - " and there's bitter triumph in how breathless his voice is - "you should go back to your - to Raguel."
"I should." He assumes a blank mask. He's had practice. "And I won't let you make me feel guilty about it."
"I want you to be happy." The angel's small smile is clearly an effort.
"You really mean that, don't you?"
But not enough, he thinks bleakly, as Aziraphael walks away, to try and bloody make me.
Postcard 5: Edward Hopper's empty room (a year).
Crowley -
I'm working hard; I doubt you'd recognise me. I hope everyone is well.
The weather continues fine.
- A.
Sometimes they exchange painfully polite phone calls. Aziraphael never tells him that he's been thinking of him, even when it's clear from his voice.
And Crowley doesn't tell him that when he's with Raguel, when they're...
He doesn't say that he's not always thinking about Aziraphael.
Postcard 6: A beach in Barbados. Crowley recognises the view. (Three years)
There's no message on the back.
Crowley just holds it for a while, familiar copperplate writing with his name, an address, the blank white space on which he can read three words clearly enough.
And he quietly says "I know."
He's always kind of admired Han Solo.
It gets pushed into the corner of a battered pinboard, tucked mostly behind the postcard of a tree and a goat.
He's received a number of polite postcards from Aziraphael. He keeps them seperately, filed in date order, in a box under his bed. Sometimes he takes them out to look at them, but less and less frequently these days.
'Time to think' is on a different scale when you're six thousand years old.
Postcard 1 (three weeks): Gondolas. Aziraphael still loves Italy, there's no escaping it, but the associations with Rome aren't what they used to be.
My dear,
the weather is lovely enough that I'm reduced to talking about it quite against my will. I'm spending a lot of time sitting in the shade with books heavy enough to be glad I needn't worry about hand luggage allowance and to be frustrated I chose to carry them.
And just so you're aware, you distract me, even when you're not here.
Give my love to everyone, and make them jealous with thoughts of how terribly tanned I could be getting, were I fool enough to go out in the midday sun.
Aziraphael.
The first time Aziraphael comes back, Crowley doesn't even hear about it until afterwards. He nods, collected and calm, and inspires a fight in the bar which is against all the rules because he can't keep listening to 'Dora say sorry.
It's okay, anyway - there's no one around to make him feel bad for it.
Postcard 2 (two months): A picture of the Eiffel tower. The caption says 'I lied when I said I was going to Scotland'.
Crowley, my dear,
The weather is awful and my books are quite damp. Much of my time is spent gazing dolefully out of windows and counting bedraggled sheep in a bid to fall asleep; it would save me from thinking about all the things I promised I would. I don't know if I'll be back as soon as I'd hoped. There's a lot of world to go looking through for answers and I'm not even sure I know the questions, yet.
I miss you.
- A
The second time, Bernard tells him first.
He falls asleep on the sofa in the back room and he wakes up cold, with a crick in his neck and no sound in the shop save for the gentle pattering of the kind of dispiriting rain it's never quite worth putting up an umbrella for. It's a fucking miserable walk home; a woman slips over and ruins her new blouse, there's a car crash not bad enough to do much more than rattle nerves and cause a fight that manages to involve far more passers by than it ought, and none of it makes him feel any better.
And then he sees the pale yellow post-it stuck to his fridge.
I'm sorry. I can't, not yet.
And Crowley leans back against the door frame and covers his mouth with one hand and laughs and laughs and hates.
Postcard 3 (seven and a half months): Quint Buchholz's Mann auf einer Leiter
Crowley -
I'd forgotten how big the world is. And such people in't! Some places rival Milliways, believe it or not; although there are, of course, important omissions.
Please give my love to everyone. I'll visit, soon.
I wish you were here.
- A.
It's dark and the grass is cold, tickling against the back of his neck, and even the Atlantean can't drown out the laughter and the rise and fall of voices and Aziraphael has to know he's out here, that's maybe the worst of it -
(And you look me in the eye and make another remark about 'one way' with a straight face)
- and Crowley takes another swig of wine and watches the stars whirl around his head.
He doesn't even notice, for a while, that he's being watched. And then he grins, and says "hey, thanks for the postcard," and Raguel's eyes are unreadable in the moonlight.
A particularly loud burst of laughter makes him wince, a little, but sunglasses hide a multitude of sins and the (other) angel doesn't say a word, doesn't try to come up with something to say, just closes his hand around the wine like he knows how Crowley feels.
The taste of the angel's mouth on the neck of the bottle is warm against the night air, and familiar enough to make it feel natural when he curls his hand around the back of Raguel's neck and pulls him down.
And some low dark voice in the back of his head hopes that Aziraphael can feel it.
Postcard 4: A duck perched on a KEEP OFF sign (seven and three quarter months)
Congratulations.
- A
"'Dora told you?"
Aziraphael turns away from the lake and smiles, that old familiar smile that has Crowley clenching his fists at his sides.
"I didn't think you'd come."
"Of course I came, you bastard."
"Really, my dear."
Crowley sees red. He grabs Aziraphael by the lapels, tweed scratching against white-knuckled fingers, and in a second he's got him pushed up - hard - against the nearest tree. Slashes of colour across the angel's cheekbones and for a second he bends his head a little, and for a second it almost looks like he might...
No.
"Yes, 'Dora told me." And he's so calm about it, and there's a deep and bloody accepting look of sadness in his blue eyes and just once Crowley wants him to fight for something. To let him know that he's worth that.
And Crowley thinks, I hate you. And he leans forward, crosses the distance that Aziraphael won't, presses him back against the tree and kisses him.
It takes him a moment or two to realise that Aziraphael's hands, curled around his, are trying to push him away.
"You should - " and there's bitter triumph in how breathless his voice is - "you should go back to your - to Raguel."
"I should." He assumes a blank mask. He's had practice. "And I won't let you make me feel guilty about it."
"I want you to be happy." The angel's small smile is clearly an effort.
"You really mean that, don't you?"
But not enough, he thinks bleakly, as Aziraphael walks away, to try and bloody make me.
Postcard 5: Edward Hopper's empty room (a year).
Crowley -
I'm working hard; I doubt you'd recognise me. I hope everyone is well.
The weather continues fine.
- A.
Sometimes they exchange painfully polite phone calls. Aziraphael never tells him that he's been thinking of him, even when it's clear from his voice.
And Crowley doesn't tell him that when he's with Raguel, when they're...
He doesn't say that he's not always thinking about Aziraphael.
Postcard 6: A beach in Barbados. Crowley recognises the view. (Three years)
There's no message on the back.
Crowley just holds it for a while, familiar copperplate writing with his name, an address, the blank white space on which he can read three words clearly enough.
And he quietly says "I know."
He's always kind of admired Han Solo.
It gets pushed into the corner of a battered pinboard, tucked mostly behind the postcard of a tree and a goat.
