(no subject)

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

Date: May 14, 2000
Setting: Front desk
Status: Private - Crowley, Aziraphale
Summary: Aziraphale is getting restless.






The thing was, Aziraphale was tired. He was exhausted of pushing paper and writing notes, performing only the barest miracles and human interaction at a minimum. He missed his old life (not that this one didn't have his perks) where he got to go out and have delicious food prepared by internationally famous chefs with expensive wines and Crowley's drunken company. He thought of their philosophical conversations that let him lay worries and fears out in a roundabout way, holes in his belief, and replenish that faith, and the angel realized, suddenly, how much he did miss them.

The Manor was becoming too familiar, and Aziraphale itched to leave, go out and have fun. He was finished in four minutes, exactly, and it would be easy to go and ask Crowley about the possibility of reenacting their old habits and finding new haunts. Aziraphale didn't even know the names of the pubs in Tadfield, after all. It was a tragedy.

Comments

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

While Aziraphale was engrossed in his paperwork, Crowley snuck around to his desk and perched himself seductively on one corner. He hadn't interrupted Aziraphale at work as often as he'd have liked and it reminded him of the days in the bookshop. Sitting patiently and very still, waiting for the angel to notice him and be startled, Crowley studied his face, amused by the fact that all the lines in his concentrated frown were in the same place as they always had been, despite his new appearance.

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

Somewhere in the distance, a pin dropped.*

Aziraphale glanced up, unsettled by the sudden but gentle silence of the lobby, and turned, catching sight of Crowley leaning against the wall in the shadows. There was an immediate flash of white teeth as Aziraphale smiled at him.

"Indulging your voyeuristic tendecies, love?" he teased gently, sparing a glance at the clock. "I'm off in, well, a minute now."


*At the hands of some poor girl, who was unfortunately far too close to a haystack.

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

Crowley grinned back. "My imagination wouldn't have to work so hard if you were wearing less clothing, angel. But if you felt like giving me something to look at, I think I could spare the time..."

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

"It's nice to see you so enthusiastic about you taking time out of your busy schedule for poor old me," Aziraphale said dryly. "Oh, look, our witty bantering took up the last minute. Fancy," he exclaimed, innocent to the last, as he stood up with a stretch.

"Well, my dear, what shall we do tonight? The same thing we do every night? Dinner in our beloved dining room, going out, takeout... or, a favourite, I believe..." He paused for effect, allowing himself another wide smile. "...room service. What would the brooding, dark demon in the corner leering at me prefer?"

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

"Room service has its perks," replied Crowley with yes, a leer, "but I'm up for something new. Want to see if they've heard of restaurants yet in this crappy little town? Or we could drive a bit and go to Oxford or London. Does the bright and shiny angel have a preference?"

Crowley thought Aziraphale would be a lot brighter and shinier if he weren't wearing that Adam forsaken brown jumper and he wondered if he could drag him shopping the way he had John three weeks prior. Unfortunately, though, Aziraphale was a lot more used to being stubbornly resistant to his wiles than John was and getting him in anything remotely attractive looked to be an uphill battle.

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

"Oh? You're thinking something for me and my shininess to be perfectly at home in, I suppose. I'm quite all right with staying in Tadfield, assuming we find a restaurant up to your standards of shiny. You seem quite doubtful of that." Aziraphale twinkled at him, and changed his clothing with a twist of his wrist*.

"Much better," he sighed, patting down the long and slightly overstarched kilt. "I like a nice breeze around my- oh, Crowley, I'm just joking, don't look so horrified. Here," he said, with another gesture, and found he was wearing a pale blue dress shirt and tan trousers. He still had on his favoured tweed jacket, but it was still better than his "work clothes".


*There was no need for theatrics but Aziraphale was rather fond of doing such hand-flappy things, ever since his days as a magician.

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

Crowley wasn't sure which emotion to express first, utter revulsion at the kilt, puzzled amusement at the fey hand gesture, distracted lust over instances where a nice breeze would be appropriate, annoyance at the shiny references when the angel had been the one to start that dark and brooding crap, or resignation at the pedestrian outfit that Aziraphale finally decided on. As always when he was confused, he defaulted to frustrated anger and with a sharp and elegant gesture, he changed Aziraphale's clothes a third time.



"There. Now you look twenty-five instead of sixty-five. You're not fooling anyone with your clothes, you know. It just looks stupid."

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

Aziraphale would've replied, but the new outfit was distracting. "A sweater vest?" he questioned, brow wrinkling in confusion. "I like the pattern, though altogether it's a bit flashy, I think." He fingered the nice material of the clothing. "Very well, my dear, demon's choice. Now are we ready?"

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

Crowley shrugged, content enough to have won the battle to be magnanimous in victory.

"I figured we could split the difference. That way you'd be comfortable enough to not change it and I wouldn't have contact embarrassment."

He changed his own clothes with a thought in order to match Aziraphale's casual look by switching his suit trousers with snug black jeans and letting his jacket hang open. Smiling smugly in the knowledge that they looked damn good*, he nodded.

"Ready when you are, angel."

And he led Aziraphale outside to where the Bentley was parked

*Apart from the angel's poofy haircut, of course, but some things were inevitable.

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

The angel blushed as he glimpsed Crowley's new outfit. Those trousers were very snug, weren't they.

Aziraphale walked into the late afternoon sunshine and felt the coolness of evening in the wind, grateful for the jacket. After they'd started off, zooming towards the city (more accurately the village) of Tadfield, Aziraphale began to fiddle with the music player. "Crowley," he asked, holding up a CD to squint at the label on it, "Who is Lou Bega?"

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

Perplexed and staring at the CD, Crowley said, "It doesn't matter. It's been in the car more than a fortnight. It'll be Queen by now." But he knew that he'd never bought a wretched Lou Bega album.

Wondering if his car was becoming sentient, he wasn't paying all that much attention to driving and he narrowly missed hitting a small, older man out walking his small, older poodle. Zooming by with inches to spare, Crowley flipped him the bird just because and swerved into Lower Tadfield's nicest restaurant, the unfortunately named Black Boy Inn.

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

"Really, my dear," Aziraphale admonished as the poor man with his poodle was miraculously moved out of harm's way, and coincidentally inside a nearby chocolate shop, where he was the one-thousandth customer to enter the store. Immediate rewards included about a lifetime supply of chocolate, which made him suddenly popular with the ladies of Tadfield.

"Black Boy Inn?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "I hope they have a decent winelist."

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

Crowley smirked at Aziraphale's action. Too bad the angel didn't know that Mr. Tyler was allergic to chocolate and that his popularity with the ladies of the town would utterly dismay both him and his wife.

"I didn't name it," he said. "And it's the only place in town with any kind of winelist. Shall we?"

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

"Please," the angel agreed graciously, "but just give me one moment..." The angel reached over, giving Crowley's knee a playful squeeze, and then used the spare second when Crowley froze to kiss him, sliding up his sunglasses as he opened his mouth and slid his tongue between Crowley's lips.

"Ready, my dear," Aziraphale replied, pulling away.

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

Raising a bemused eyebrow, Crowley wondered if he'd been too good at tempting the angel. Or being tempted by the angel. Or something. He still wasn't quite sure how they'd gotten to this point. Still, it made him feel fizzy and warm, like he'd already had two drinks on an empty stomach, and he was ready for the actual alcohol to catch up.

"Someday, someplace, when you're least expecting it..." he murmured with a wicked grin on his face as he led Aziraphale into the restaurant.

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

"I wouldn't expect anything less," Aziraphale told him, most agreeable with the prospect of being pounced at a late date.

The vast array of beautiful fixtures and furniture was surprising. They were seated immediately (but of course) and Aziraphale took the opportunity to admire their surroundings.

"Let me guess," he said as he sat down, bringing in his chair and picking up the fabled winelist. "The only fancy restaurant in town?"

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

"You have to ask?"

Crowley picked up his menu and began to peruse it. It seemed like pretty standard upper class British food with some French influences. He thought he'd be safest with one of the simpler dishes and was thinking about the roast lamb when a waiter walked by with two glasses of red wine on his way to another table.

It really was terribly unfortunate when the poor man tripped over his own feet and poured the wine over the white blouse of a female customer at another table. Crowley felt a smirk tug at his lips as she shrieked. This was more like it.

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

Aziraphale gave a long-suffering sigh, decidedly not rolling his eyes, and turned his gaze back to his menu, perusing through the list.

"Gewurztraminer?" he asked Crowley. "Unless you'd prefer something else entirely?"

(The waiter apologized and offered to pay for the blouse, which coincidentally matched a very grand tip he'd been left in the next receipt to pick up. The woman's date also very gallantly gave her his jacket to wear, which miraculously fit.)

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

Considering this, Crowley asked, "Is it French, Italian, or Eastern European?"

He didn't mind the angel's interference this time. As it turned out, the waiter lost a tip, the woman lost her favourite blouse, and her date lost a jacket because it was now miraculously too small for him to ever wear again and it had cost a lot more than the woman's shirt. Crowley chalked it up as a win and returned to his menu.

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

"A Gewurz? It's an Alsace one, my dear, most modern. Avez-vous decide?"

Aziraphale seamlessly flipped to the dessert menu as he spoke, reading down the list of descriptions with something akin to joy.

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

"Well that's all right then. Those Hungarian ones just aren't the same. Bien-sur. J'ai le canard. Et tu?"

Crowley smiled faintly as the angel's face disappeared behind the dessert menu. It had been far too long since they'd done this. He wondered if he'd get more than two bites of his own dessert this evening. Maybe if he played his cards right...

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

"Cheesecake," he announced, blond head emerging. "Er," the angel added, a bit quieter, "I have a craving for a raspberry cheesecake. It will be a little sweet for the Gewurtz- and don't smirk at me, my dear, I know you, and I know that you're laughing at my dissatisfaction of this detail, but I daresay that I am right in this case. But I will persevere and we shall perish - quite happily, perhaps - from massive amounts of sweets tonight."

The waiter arrived, and they both ordered the duck - although Aziraphale had long found canard to be a ridiculous word, even when he couldn't remember it as a langue de boeuf or a langue d'ouef word, precisely. Probably the latter; the French had a weird sense of humour.

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

"No, you've got me all wrong, angel. I'm laughing because you decided on your dessert before your dinner. Crappy wine pairing or no. And because I'll be policing your sweets intake. You really shouldn't let your brand new body go like that. Gluttony is a sin, you know."

Crowley smirked again just because he could and his foot found Aziraphale's beneath the table.

[ineffable-angel.livejournal.com]

Aziraphale raised an ambiguous eyebrow.

"I thought I'd decided on supper, dear. The duck?" He sniffed decorously. "It's not a familiar restaurant, I'd hate to choose something that would turn out awful." As was his luck before in a new restaurant, they both knew. "Remember Russia, not so long ago?" He wore a pained expression simply at the memory.

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

"How could I forget? I did suggest you keep it simple..."