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"You reopened the shop!" Aziraphale is surprised to find Crowley behind the counter (well, on the counter, per usual) when he arrives home shortly after five with their takeaway. He had rather imagined walking in on a deliciously disheveled Crowley asleep on the sofa upstairs but --
"Ah," Crowley scratches his ear. "Yeah, well. Sky had a lecture."
"Sky...?" Aziraphale casts his mind back, momentarily lost, sure their conversation about Sky had happened before Crowley had asked him about pornography. He tries to recalibrate, although it’s somewhat difficult with Crowley right there. The scent of orgasm still clings to him, and Aziraphale can feel his own body kindling in response as he navigates around a front table and draws up in front of Crowley where he sits on the counter.
"Did you know she was reading theology?" Crowley doesn't directly answer Aziraphale's question. Instead, he uncrosses his legs and slides off the counter into Aziraphale's waiting arms. Aziraphale hmmms in appreciation of the contact, melting against Crowley’s front. Crowley leans forward into Aziraphale's willing mouth and gives him an unhurried, welcome home kiss. It's lovely to be reminded all over again that kisses from Crowley are now a commonplace. Though no less treasured for being so.
"We had the most delightful discussion about the architecture of mosques in the late Ottoman Empire during her last visit," Aziraphale responds a bit breathlessly, when Crowley pulls back. He’ll do his best to hold up his end of this conversation. He’s momentarily distracted by memory of the discussion, which had been most engaging, even as he leans further forward to follow Crowley’s retreating mouth. "Did she come looking for help with her essay topic? I did say --"
"I hired her," Crowley says, with a self-satisfied grin. He dodges Azirphale’s seeking kisses to say it, then presses his lips to a spot he particularly likes at the base of Aziraphale’s ear. Aziraphale whimpers his approval before his distracted mind can parse the words Crowley has uttered for meaning.
"Hired her?" Aziraphale he repeats, blinking. He can’t recall ever doing something as scandalously human as hiring someone before. How does one even go about doing that? And why is Crowley talking about hiring anyone while his fingers are sliding beneath Azirphale’s suit jacket to pull him closer with warm palms at the base of his spine.
"I offered her a job. She accepted. She's extremely helpful with humans." Crowley says this in a mumble at the side of his throat and why are they doing this now? Crowley is stubbornly clothed, and the shop door is still unlocked. Aziraphale flaps a hand toward the lock and uses the same zephyr of energy to flip the sign from open to closed. It’s been a long day and he wants to take these kisses -- and sushi -- upstairs.
"She'll be back tomorrow morning to do the, er, paperwork." Crowley says, grinning, as Aziraphale tugs Crowley away from the counter towards the foot of the stairs to the flat.
"Paperwork?" Aziraphale squeaks, tripping over his own heels. "What sort of paperwork?"
"Eh, I'll work it out." Crowley sounds amused as he catches Aziraphale as he stumbles and rights him, sliding his palms down Aziraphale's sides and pulling him closer by the belt loops. They collide somewhat awkwardly in the middle of the shop, narrowly missing the corner of a nearby shelf. Crowley leans down to offer the next words right against Aziraphale’s ear: "Right now I'm extremely interested in getting you out of this truly horrific suit."
"You like this suit," Aziraphale shivers at being able to voice such a simple truth aloud as he turns his face to press a kiss to Crowley's cheek. He noses at the earpiece of Crowley’s sunglasses, but between the takeaway in one hand and hanging on to Crowley’s sweater to keep himself upright he doesn’t have a free hand to pull them off. He looks forward to the moment when they go upstairs and Crowley pulls off his sunglasses at the door.
"Of course I do," Crowley says, easily, as if he hadn't resisted admitting exactly that since tartan was invented. "But I like it even better off."
It’s quiet and dark as they ascend to the flat; they’re moving towards the longest night of the year in the northern hemisphere. Aziraphale has always liked darkness; he associates long evenings with candles and oil lamps and cheesy toast made over the fire. In years past, Crowley could be counted on to spend more time with Aziraphale during the colder months -- even if he did so sluggishly and sleepily. Crowley in winter has been more pliant, historically less likely to remember he ought to be keeping Aziraphale at arms length. Of course, he's given up that pretense altogether and Aziraphale has been looking forward with a soul-deep anticipation to the first winter of being able to draw Crowley into bed every night and keep him warm.
He turns as they step into the flat and reaches up to pull Crowley's sunglasses off. "There," he says with satisfaction, setting them on the hall table. "That's better."
Crowley smiles a smile that is only ever for Aziraphale. "That's how I feel about all of your clothes."
Aziraphale blushes, feeling all-overish with his awareness of Crowley.
"Shall we?" He lifts the paper sack containing their sushi order.
"Mmm." Crowley snaps his fingers and the paper sack is gone from Aziraphale’s hand. "No, I think not. There was something you promised to do for me when you came home."
Prickling arousal floods through Aziraphale in response to the desire and focus in Crowley’s tone. He should probably make sure Crowley has remembered to put the raw fish in the fridge but other concerns feel more pressing. "Oh?" He has to clear the catch in his throat. "You should, um, remind me."
Crowley shakes his head in mock despair. "Forget so soon?" He's pushed off Aziraphale's suitcoat and is already working at the tortoiseshell buttons of his waistcoat. He cocks his head in mock consideration. "Something about a book of poetry."
"It was a very nice book of poetry," Aziraphale says, solemnly, if a bit breathlessly. "I still have it in my collection. Were you requesting a dramatic reading?"
Crowley coughs on whatever he was going to say next. "I hadn't, uh, thought of that but it does have an undeniable … appeal. Perhaps … later?” He ends on an Aziraphale-like squeak and Aziraphale files that reaction away for further exploration.
Crowley has Aziraphale's waistcoat undone and reaches next for the bowtie.
"I thought all day about how you would undress me," Aziraphale murmurs, tipping his chin up a fraction and closing his eyes so that Crowley can make deft work of the knot.
"Did you really?" Crowley sounds surprised.
"Of course, my dear," Aziraphale looks down and reaches up to stroke his palm down Crowley's jaw. "You taking off my clothes, you touching my skin, will never grow old."
Crowley nips the pad of Aziraphale's thumb as he drags it across Crowley's lower lip. "What did you think about, then, my angel," he murmurs as he slides his hands up under Aziraphale's shirt.
"I - It feels good," Aziraphale says. "When you help me dress in the morning and then undress me at -- at night." He isn’t yet sure how to say why. One day, maybe soon, he’ll work it out. Thankfully, they have time.
Crowley's palms slide outward across Aziraphale's skin until his fingers curve around Aziraphale's ribs. Aziraphale sighs as he feels his lungs expand and the tension in his shoulders ease. "Ah," murmurs Crowley, like he's just confirmed a working theory. "Well, then. Let's proceed. Sofa or bed?"
"Sofa," Aziraphale whispers back, leaning toward Crowley for another kiss as Crowley walks him backward across the room. "I want to be where you were."
The back of his calves meet the sofa cushions and he sits for lack of a better idea about what to do next. He has a vague understanding of what Crowley wants ... that he wants Aziraphale to disrobe and touch himself as he had back then, only this time Crowley will be there to watch. And maybe also touch him.
It's a dreadfully embarrassing idea. He also hasn't stopped thinking about how the particular form of being seen might feel since Crowley first suggested it by text. He runs his hands nervously through his own hair, then down his trouser legs. Crowley, on his knees before Aziraphale, puts his palms gently over the backs of Aziraphale's hands. He encourages Aziraphale's knees open and shifts forward to kneel between them. Then he leans further forward to press a soft kiss to the corner of Aziraphale’s mouth.
"What --?" Aziraphale squeaks nervously, then clears his throat. "This is, what shall I do first?"
"What did you do first?" Crowley turns the question back around.
"Er, um --" Aziraphale casts his mind back. "I suppose I began with my shirt."
Punctuating his movements with more soft kisses, Crowley unbuttons Aziraphale's shirt, pushes it off his shoulders, eases his arms free and tosses it aside, then pulls the vest off over his head, leaving Aziraphale bare from the waist up. "And then?"
It feels awkward, with Crowley's eyes upon him, but Aziraphale lifts one hand and smoothes it down his own arm. Crowley repeats the motion with his own hand, stroking down Aziraphale's arm from shoulder to wrist. Aziraphale's skin prickles at the touch. He closes his eyes and conjures up the sun-baked clay walls of that long-ago room, the wash stand, the sleeping pallet, the evening slant of sun through the one narrow window. He strokes a second time, on the other side, and again Crowley follows. Crowley’s palms feel warmer, softer than his own. Crowley dips his thumb into the notch of Aziraphale’s elbow, where Aziraphale can feel the shimmer of arousal collecting in the creases of his skin. Aziraphale shivers when Crowley pulls his hand away.
Aziraphale swallows and licks his lips.
"And then..." Aziraphale murmurs, lifting his hand to his own neck, dragging his fingers from the hinge of his jaw down across his bared collarbone. With Crowley this close, watching him, he can feel the tightness at his shoulders that will itch and ache soon enough, that will make him beg for Crowley's touch. Now that he knows what it is, how good it feels, to have Crowley's fingers kneading that tender place where his selves slide ungracefully together he isn’t sure how he withstood so many centuries of never having Crowley’s hands to ease him.
"Like this," Crowley breathes, reverently, laying down another ghosting touch along the path Aziraphale has blazed. "Did you lie down for me?"
"Mmm," Aziraphale agrees.
"Show me." Crowley leans in once again to sweetens his request with a kiss.
Aziraphale blinks open his eyes and allows Crowley to rearrange his limbs, slip his shoes and socks off, rest a palm flat at the front of his trousers and thumb open the button. The pad of Crowley's thumb grazes his belly just below the navel.
Aziraphale puts his own hand to Crowley's cheek. "This is where you read my texts?"
Crowley turns and presses a kiss to Aziraphale's palm. "Mmm."
"I did take my trousers off first." Aziraphale lifts his hips up into Crowley's hand encouragingly. "That night." They probably hadn’t been trousers as such but he’s not about to ask for time to do the historical research necessary for an accurate recreation of his costume.
"Well, then," Crowley says, and snaps his fingers. And there he is, skin to skin, curling gentle fingers around Aziraphale's cock. Aziraphale whimpers into the touch -- and then with a whisper of movement and eddy of cool air, Crowley pulls away. "Your turn, sweetheart," he says. A new endearment. "Show me what next."
It had been one thing to sit, neatly and quietly, surrounded by rare books in a public space thinking -- in detail -- about how much he loved everything about Crowley. Aziraphale is practiced at doing that without drawing attention for centuries. It's another thing altogether to be naked, on his own sofa, with Crowley kneeling still fully clothed on the floor beside him. Watching him. Aziraphale is still acclimating to the weight of Crowley's gaze now that he allows himself to truly, openly look. The intensity of it makes Aziraphale’s shoulders itch and pull with the struggle of wings eager to manifest and the glimmer on his skin is fast becoming a slick sheen of arousal, making every touch that much more. Knowing he gets to have this is every sensation he has ever felt around Crowley magnified by the order of every star in the heavens. He wants both to hide from the truth of it (in Crowley's arms, for preference) and never look away.
"You're shining for me," Crowley murmurs, still not touching Aziraphale. Aziraphale closes his eyes with a shudder and turns his attention inward. He can feel Crowley, there, too. Because Crowley is everywhere with him: tethered, it feels, more tightly with each kiss, each caress, each slither of cool power against Aziraphale’s unruly grace. Crowley is his surety.
Aziraphale hadn't been at all sure, that long-ago night. Had reason to hope, perhaps. But he was an angel, and a poor one at that. Whether Crowley yearned to return from exile to Heaven or had buggered off downward with a rude gesture as the gates swung closed behind … well, Aziraphale had thought: Aziraphale, himself, was probably not someone worth tempting. The further away Crowley was, physically, in those years, the harder Aziraphale had to reach for the assurance of him. And the stronger his self-doubt became. On that evening in Damascus Aziraphale had been full of doubt.
On this November night in Soho, Aziraphale wishes he could comfort his younger self. He loves you. He longs for you. He wants this as much as you do. He can't unpick time -- wouldn't truly wish to, if given the chance, because where and who they currently are is the sum and more of where they have been. All of the painful parts included. But he does wish he could grant his past self the gift of reassurance.
Instead, he does what he can, which is to consecrate the memory of past uncertainties with what has now come to be: Crowley, here in this room, gazing at him with love and wonder. Crowley, who hisses softly as Aziraphale tips his chin up to bare his throat and drags shimmering fingers downward in a long exploratory stroke.
The first time he had brought himself to orgasm, Aziraphale had had no map. Only bewildering symptoms: feverish skin, slippery arousal, a mind that wouldn't settle, an ache between his shoulders, and another at his groin. He had known Crowley's absence keenly -- seemingly in every atom -- and yet felt him, there, in the soft darkness of that room in which he felt restlessly confined until he stopped being quite so ... visible. His body and his mind had clearly needed something, and he wasn’t exactly ignorant of human copulation. He'd been on Earth since Eve gave her first enthusiastic Yes to Adam and seen enough pornographia to understand that human bodies came together in many pleasurable ways. If you liked that sort of thing. The problem was that none of the painted pottery, naughty illuminated manuscripts, obscene limited-edition folios, or love songs he's encountered in over five millennia on Earth were very instructional. They generally took the audience to understand how human parts worked. And, despite his lengthy tenure in this form, Aziraphale had felt deeply uncertain.
And, impossibly distracting, he had been leaking. The opalescent fluid on his skin had been joined by other fluid collecting at the tip of his cock and merely thinking about either of these bodily excesses seemed to produce more.
He had screwed his eyes shut and thought of the pornographic frontispiece tipped in to the volume of Rumi poetry now sitting on his washstand wrapped in brown paper. He hadn't needed to open it since the illustration was etched on the inside of his retinas. The poet and his lover had been depicted sitting close together on a sleeping mat, lush embroidered robes open to expose bare chests and heavy, outsized cocks and testicles drawn at that oddly flattened angle many artists used to render the relevant parts of the human body visible even as they made clear those parts were in intimate contact. But despite the distortion it was clear that the lovers were touching one another here: Aziraphale had shifted, allowing his legs to fall open, and moved his flattened palm down over his torso to the place where his own penis was flushed and curving upward from the near-white curls at his groin.
His body had done this very occasionally in the past -- grown stiff and sensitive, almost painful to touch. He had accommodated it until the sensitivity faded and his body resumed normal functioning. It wasn't that he had never connected those episodes with acts of human copulation before -- it was, perhaps, that he had only thought of his passing half-formed erections rather abstractly in those terms. As a vestigial response of his human form, meant for procreative acts he has no need for ... not something that was connected to the longings he felt for Crowley. Not something that was his.
On the sofa, in the present, Aziraphale slides his fingers in a slow, circling pathway down his torso. Strictly speaking he should have ignored his nipples; he hadn't discovered the erotic benefits of those until the early 18th century. But Crowley likes to give them attention and now Aziraphale knows that he very much likes Crowley to spend slow, unhurried them with them. So he teases them to tight nubs, standing at attention amidst the sparse hair on his chest, and enjoys the tug of response at his groin as he traces the puckered areola with a finger and then pinches at the peak. First right, then left.
He can feel Crowley's power flare in the air around them as Aziraphale works his hand and swallows, mouth suddenly dry, wondering if this is how Crowley had imagined it. Should he be … narrating? But no, he already has Crowley's undivided attention. He brings his other hand up to the top of his thigh and rests it there, thumb just nudging against the root of his cock. His body wants more, and firmer, contact but that first time he had had to go slow: He had been shaking from need and the lightest contact had threatened to be too much. So he holds himself back.
He thinks back, combing his fingertips through the damp unruly curls, abundant at his groin, pushing through them even further to cup his testicles, gently, and remembers how he had first laid a palm against his penis, awkwardly, hesitantly, hissing at the touch and almost jerking his hand away. How his penis had seemed to jump in his hand of its own accord. He had resisted the reflex to pull away, panting with the effort, and struggled to consider the sensation. Had it felt … pleasurable? Painful? Then he had imagined it was Crowley's hand in place of his own.
"Oh, my dear," Aziraphale whispers from the sofa, pushing up against the heel of his own hand, and Crowley leans over him to press a kiss to his lips, bringing a hand to rest lightly over Aziraphale’s own.
"You thought of me?" Crowley asks, hoarse, a question that Aziraphale will answer as many times as Crowley needs him to.
"Always. Every time."
He opens his eyes to say it, because he needs to know Crowley understands that he means it. That Crowley is the only one he has ever wanted to be this vulnerable before, the only one Aziraphale has ever trusted this much. Even Crowley's hair is reaching for Aziraphale, having grown several enthusiastic inches since Aziraphale closed his eyes. One hand still under Crowley's at his groin, Aziraphale brings the other hand up to brush the twisting curls away from Crowley's face.
"Would you like to help, my dear? Or do you wish to continue watching?"
Crowley's snakey tongue flicks out. Aziraphale has had that tongue in his mouth earlier today, before they'd risen from bed so that Crowley could dress him in all of his glorious bookseller’s plaid. Aziraphale runs his own tongue against his lower lip at the memory. Slowly Crowley pulls back to sit on his heels and Aziraphale lets him, shuddering as Crowley traces one, gentle finger around the head of his cock, just above where Aziraphale is holding himself, before pulling fully away.
"You're very good at this all on your own," Crowley points out as if they're discussing who should make the next pot of tea.
Aziraphale allows his legs to fall open even further and pulls up a knee so he can slide his hand down and then back up the inside of his thigh where Crowley can see. "Really?" He means to make it seductive but fears that the tone is closer to breathless.
"Truly," Crowley says with no sign he's making fun of Aziraphale's artless performance. "My angel, I would watch you pleasure yourself all night if you let me."
"All ... night?" Aziraphale is hoarse with the thought.
"Mmm," Crowley agrees. "Every minute of it."
It hadn't taken long, in the end, that first time. In retrospect, of course, Aziraphale had been building up to that initial orgasm for hours (if not, arguably, decades). Once he'd made the connection between how he felt about Crowley and this -- well, his body provided the most encouraging feedback. Once he got beyond the initial, hesitant touches -- a testing of pressure and pace -- Aziraphale had been a quick study. All he had had to do was reach for Crowley's unmistakable there-ness in the world -- touch of a kind, always allowable because Crowley hadn't rejected it and because his superiors hadn't believed Crawly had purity to preserve -- and it was as if all of the explanations and illustrations and bawdy poems suddenly made sense because Crowley's form gave shape to them.
"Oh!" He had gasped, soundlessly, as his body clenched impossibly tight and he came with a final upwelling of fluids and the taste of rust on his tongue.
It doesn't take terribly long this evening either, though for very different reasons. He knows his human form, now, much better than before. He's so much less afraid. Crowley is right there and, somehow what they’re doing feels all the more intimate because Aziraphale is so wantonly displaying himself while Crowley remains clothed. Had Crowley had similar thoughts earlier today when he'd come on this very couch? Aziraphale imagines Crowley with his jeans shoved hastily down his thighs, hand at the cleft, fingers stroking hidden places Aziraphale now knows most intimately. He can almost feel Crowley under his own fingers as he works his hand steadily along the length of his prick: A tight, slippery pull up the length, a slight twist of the wrist as he reaches the head, then back down. Again. And again.
"That's it," Crowley purrs approvingly. "Come for me. Come for me like you always have and always will."
And that's all he needs. Aziraphale is writhing up into his own grip, with a twist and stutter of hips, free hand flung out looking for something, anything, Crowley to cling to, and there's Crowley reaching to catch him and hold him. He spills over his hand and feels a final rush of iridescence well up from within.
The receding tide of orgasm leaves him feeling suddenly shaky, needy and bewildered. He’s quaking, shivering, though not from cold. Crowley -- truly more than Aziraphale has ever deserved -- understands what he needs before Aziraphale has put words to it and pulls Aziraphale, a sticky tangle of post-coital limbs, into his lap so he can hold him in a firm embrace and massage the ache of half-manifest wings between Aziraphale's shoulder blades.
"Let them out for me, sweetheart," Crowley whispers against Aziraphale's neck. "Show me."
Aziraphale lets go and there's a rush of displaced air and power around them. Aziraphale shudders anew at the pleasure of release. Crowley keeps touching, touching him, hands and energy sliding over skin and the part of himself that manifests here as the Earthly concept of wings. This close on the heels of orgasm they're barely stable, grace more than anything, and Aziraphale shudders as the cool swirl of Crowley moves through him with serpentine grace. Touching, touching, touching, within and without, his world narrows to Crowley. He digs his fingers into Crowley's shoulders and hangs on with no plans to ever again let go.
They end up sprawled on the carpet with Crowley murmuring under him, words that would make Aziraphale blush if he weren't in a state beyond embarrassment. Because Crowley is touching all of him, and Aziraphale knows Crowley will never shame him for this, for them, for anything Aziraphale wishes to give.
Eventually he drags his palm down Crowley's front, realizing all over again that Crowley never undressed and now he probably has angel goo everywhere. He fumbles at Crowley's fly like he's still learning how human fingers work until Crowley gives a lovely rich chuckle and bats his hand away to undo the zip himself. Aziraphale sighs with contentment when Crowley guides his hand back down, inside the trousers, and there's Crowley's own soft bits waiting for him.
He slides to one side so Crowley can shift his hips enough to allow Aziraphale’s fingers inside, a wordless dance they've now done dozens of times since high summer. It's still miraculous, being inside Crowley in this tactile, human way -- with a particularity no other angel would countenance and a tenderness no other demon could survive. Just them. His thumb finds one nub, then the other, both swollen with Crowley's desire, and he rubs lazy circles there as he strokes in and out and in again, curling his fingertips against trembling, clenching muscles. His wings shudder all around them and Crowley's energy crackles in the air. Other than that, it's silent but for the small slick sounds of their coming together again, and again, and again. Then Crowley gives a small grunt -- so soft Aziraphale only hears it because his face is tucked into the taut, straining line of Crowley's neck -- and he's coming with a crack of almost-lightning, with a squeeze of his muscles so tight around Aziraphale's wrist that Aziraphale suspects from past experience he will bruise.
They sprawl on the carpet, spent, for quite some time. Even so, Crowley makes a small noise of protest when Aziraphale finally pulls free.
"Right here," Aziraphale murmurs. "I'm right here." He lifts the hand and brushes Crowley's tangled, now-quiescent hair from his face, then leans forward for a kiss. "You've let your hair grow long again." He lays a hand along Crowley's cheek. "Let me braid it for you tonight."
"Please," Crowley assents, with a sigh.