Happy Holidays, Secret_Weapon!
Title: Christmas Shopping and the consequences thereof
Recipient: secret_weapon
Author: guil_solo
Rating:PG
Like Christmas (and as a result of it), Christmas shopping only comes once a year.
But that was quite enough for Crowley. He’d finally bowed to pressure1 from Aziraphale and adopted the human custom a while back, telling himself that ‘it’s nothing to do with the season, and anyway, look at all the misery it generates’. That was indeed true, but he had not taken into account the fact that said misery would also apply to him.
It hadn’t for the first couple of years, of course. In fact, Christmas shopping had been a rather uplifting experience. He’d grinned cheerfully at all the people stuck in never-ending queues at the till, and made sure that he knocked a fair few of them in the shins with his shopping as he passed, engaged harassed-looking parents in useless chatter as their hyper offspring knocked over displays of breakable ornaments, and generally made a lot of people angry. Well, angrier. And it was fun.
But after a while, he realised that there was only so much you could do whilst stuck in the queue in M&S waiting to spend an inordinate amount of money on a pair of tartan socks, and he’d already done most of it. The yearly shop became a chore, then an annoyance, and finally something he attempted to put off until at least the last minute, if not after. But he would always get it done. Of course, technically he could have created the gifts out of the ether, but that somehow wouldn’t have been quite the same.
Which was why he was standing in the middle of a large branch of a certain high street chain at nine o’clock in the evening on the twenty fourth of December, agonising over whether Aziraphale would prefer black socks with tartan toes, or tartan socks with black toes2. This was a very difficult decision to make, and his thought processes were not helped by the presence of two very annoying factors. Firstly, the ‘muzak’ in the shop was blaring out at a volume and pitch calculated to set even a demon’s teeth on edge (and, what was worse, said ‘muzak’ was selections from a tape which must have been called something along the lines of ‘Everything you never wanted to hear in a department store on Christmas Eve’). Secondly, a small, pink, extremely beribboned, and worryingly determined girl was attacking his knees with something that was either a very refined torture instrument, or a Barbie doll (not that, in Crowley’s eyes at least, there was much difference between the two).
He toyed briefly with the idea of giving it all up as a bad job and heading home, but the thought of receiving a major gift from Aziraphale and having nothing to give him in return was just too awful for words. So he gritted his teeth, gave the girl a surreptitious slap on the head that sent her off howling, and returned to his studies of the relative merits of different sorts of horribly-patterned footwear.
After what seemed like an eternity, he was jolted out of the stupor he had sunk into by a light tap on the shoulder. He turned around, and was surprised to find himself face to face with the one person he had really not been expecting to see.
“Aziraphale?”
The angel looked at him in an infuriatingly calm fashion. “Shopping?” he asked, touching the nearest of the socks delicately with his fingertip.
Crowley favoured him with a smouldering glare, and snatched the garment away.
“What,” he enunciated carefully “does it look like?”
Aziraphale nodded in understanding. “I like the tartan best,” he suggested. “If that’s any help.”
The demon shoved the rejected pair of socks back onto the wrong shelf, and stalked off purposefully towards the nearest till, hurling a perfunctory “thanks!” over his shoulder as he went.
Realising that his presence would probably stop Crowley from committing shoppercide, Aziraphale hurried after his friend, carefully sidestepping to avoid the small girl, who had returned for a second assault. He had to admit, even his angelic patience was being somewhat strained by this.
******* *******
Two and a half hours, five arguments and an infinite number of swearwords later, they left the shop. Crowley, who had calmed down slightly by this time, offered Aziraphale a ride home in his Bentley, as it had begun to rain heavily3, and the angel did not seem exactly over-enamoured of the prospect of getting his new overcoat wet.
Aziraphale accepted the invitation and, despite the fact that the tape of carols he had bought metamorphosed into ‘Queen’s Greatest Hits’ halfway through ‘God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen’ (much to Crowley’s relief, it has to be said, although he had, of course, had nothing whatsoever to do with the switch), the half-hour drive back to the bookshop passed in friendly conversation about nothing very much.
Crowley walked with Aziraphale to the door of the shop - it seemed the friendly thing to do - and, as they reached it, they both turned, almost involuntarily, and looked up at the sky. For a moment, there was silence. Then the first chime of midnight rang out, and peals of bells shattered the relative calm of the night. Aziraphale looked at Crowley. Crowley looked at Aziraphale.
“Well, I’d better be-”
“I should-”
They stopped. They looked at each other. Aziraphale turned round, and began to fumble with his keys. Crowley started to walk back towards the Bentley.
Then, almost at the same moment, they turned around to face each other again.
“I just wanted to say-”
“I suppose I ought to thank-”
They stopped, again. They looked at each other, again.
Then Crowley stepped forwards, took Aziraphale’s face between his hands, and kissed him, hard.
The angel’s eyes widened, his eyebrows arching in surprise, and he made a sound that could only be described as “guh?”. This would probably have made a little more sense if his mouth had not been covered by the demon’s, but he remained incapable of rational speech until some time after Crowley had released him, turned to walk back to the Bentley, obviously remembered something, turned back and said “Oh, and by the way, angel - Merry Christmas!”
~end~
1 Not very much pressure, it must be said. It was more the fact that Aziraphale would turn up on Crowley’s doorstep on Christmas morning with a nicely wrapped parcel, usually containing some piece of technology the demon had been obsessing over for most of that year, and would sit and watch Crowley open it with a smile that was oh-so-slightly annoyingly smug. Crowley had grown increasingly annoyed with said smile, and he was determined to assuage his growing sense of guilt (an alien emotion to him up until that point) by making an effort to return the favour.
2 It had never occurred to him to buy the angel anything other than socks - mostly because Aziraphale seemed to like receiving them. Aziraphale, on his part, never suggested that Crowley buy anything other than socks, because he did like receiving them. After all, one can never have too many pairs of tartan footwear (if one is an angel with a passion for the pattern, that is)
3 In most other countries on Christmas Eve, it would be snowing. However, our story takes place in England, and in England, it rains. Even at Christmas. In fact, it would be more correct to say: Especially at Christmas. It’s just one of those things.
Happy Holidays, secret_weapon from your Secret Writer!
Recipient: secret_weapon
Author: guil_solo
Rating:PG
Like Christmas (and as a result of it), Christmas shopping only comes once a year.
But that was quite enough for Crowley. He’d finally bowed to pressure1 from Aziraphale and adopted the human custom a while back, telling himself that ‘it’s nothing to do with the season, and anyway, look at all the misery it generates’. That was indeed true, but he had not taken into account the fact that said misery would also apply to him.
It hadn’t for the first couple of years, of course. In fact, Christmas shopping had been a rather uplifting experience. He’d grinned cheerfully at all the people stuck in never-ending queues at the till, and made sure that he knocked a fair few of them in the shins with his shopping as he passed, engaged harassed-looking parents in useless chatter as their hyper offspring knocked over displays of breakable ornaments, and generally made a lot of people angry. Well, angrier. And it was fun.
But after a while, he realised that there was only so much you could do whilst stuck in the queue in M&S waiting to spend an inordinate amount of money on a pair of tartan socks, and he’d already done most of it. The yearly shop became a chore, then an annoyance, and finally something he attempted to put off until at least the last minute, if not after. But he would always get it done. Of course, technically he could have created the gifts out of the ether, but that somehow wouldn’t have been quite the same.
Which was why he was standing in the middle of a large branch of a certain high street chain at nine o’clock in the evening on the twenty fourth of December, agonising over whether Aziraphale would prefer black socks with tartan toes, or tartan socks with black toes2. This was a very difficult decision to make, and his thought processes were not helped by the presence of two very annoying factors. Firstly, the ‘muzak’ in the shop was blaring out at a volume and pitch calculated to set even a demon’s teeth on edge (and, what was worse, said ‘muzak’ was selections from a tape which must have been called something along the lines of ‘Everything you never wanted to hear in a department store on Christmas Eve’). Secondly, a small, pink, extremely beribboned, and worryingly determined girl was attacking his knees with something that was either a very refined torture instrument, or a Barbie doll (not that, in Crowley’s eyes at least, there was much difference between the two).
He toyed briefly with the idea of giving it all up as a bad job and heading home, but the thought of receiving a major gift from Aziraphale and having nothing to give him in return was just too awful for words. So he gritted his teeth, gave the girl a surreptitious slap on the head that sent her off howling, and returned to his studies of the relative merits of different sorts of horribly-patterned footwear.
After what seemed like an eternity, he was jolted out of the stupor he had sunk into by a light tap on the shoulder. He turned around, and was surprised to find himself face to face with the one person he had really not been expecting to see.
“Aziraphale?”
The angel looked at him in an infuriatingly calm fashion. “Shopping?” he asked, touching the nearest of the socks delicately with his fingertip.
Crowley favoured him with a smouldering glare, and snatched the garment away.
“What,” he enunciated carefully “does it look like?”
Aziraphale nodded in understanding. “I like the tartan best,” he suggested. “If that’s any help.”
The demon shoved the rejected pair of socks back onto the wrong shelf, and stalked off purposefully towards the nearest till, hurling a perfunctory “thanks!” over his shoulder as he went.
Realising that his presence would probably stop Crowley from committing shoppercide, Aziraphale hurried after his friend, carefully sidestepping to avoid the small girl, who had returned for a second assault. He had to admit, even his angelic patience was being somewhat strained by this.
******* *******
Two and a half hours, five arguments and an infinite number of swearwords later, they left the shop. Crowley, who had calmed down slightly by this time, offered Aziraphale a ride home in his Bentley, as it had begun to rain heavily3, and the angel did not seem exactly over-enamoured of the prospect of getting his new overcoat wet.
Aziraphale accepted the invitation and, despite the fact that the tape of carols he had bought metamorphosed into ‘Queen’s Greatest Hits’ halfway through ‘God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen’ (much to Crowley’s relief, it has to be said, although he had, of course, had nothing whatsoever to do with the switch), the half-hour drive back to the bookshop passed in friendly conversation about nothing very much.
Crowley walked with Aziraphale to the door of the shop - it seemed the friendly thing to do - and, as they reached it, they both turned, almost involuntarily, and looked up at the sky. For a moment, there was silence. Then the first chime of midnight rang out, and peals of bells shattered the relative calm of the night. Aziraphale looked at Crowley. Crowley looked at Aziraphale.
“Well, I’d better be-”
“I should-”
They stopped. They looked at each other. Aziraphale turned round, and began to fumble with his keys. Crowley started to walk back towards the Bentley.
Then, almost at the same moment, they turned around to face each other again.
“I just wanted to say-”
“I suppose I ought to thank-”
They stopped, again. They looked at each other, again.
Then Crowley stepped forwards, took Aziraphale’s face between his hands, and kissed him, hard.
The angel’s eyes widened, his eyebrows arching in surprise, and he made a sound that could only be described as “guh?”. This would probably have made a little more sense if his mouth had not been covered by the demon’s, but he remained incapable of rational speech until some time after Crowley had released him, turned to walk back to the Bentley, obviously remembered something, turned back and said “Oh, and by the way, angel - Merry Christmas!”
~end~
1 Not very much pressure, it must be said. It was more the fact that Aziraphale would turn up on Crowley’s doorstep on Christmas morning with a nicely wrapped parcel, usually containing some piece of technology the demon had been obsessing over for most of that year, and would sit and watch Crowley open it with a smile that was oh-so-slightly annoyingly smug. Crowley had grown increasingly annoyed with said smile, and he was determined to assuage his growing sense of guilt (an alien emotion to him up until that point) by making an effort to return the favour.
2 It had never occurred to him to buy the angel anything other than socks - mostly because Aziraphale seemed to like receiving them. Aziraphale, on his part, never suggested that Crowley buy anything other than socks, because he did like receiving them. After all, one can never have too many pairs of tartan footwear (if one is an angel with a passion for the pattern, that is)
3 In most other countries on Christmas Eve, it would be snowing. However, our story takes place in England, and in England, it rains. Even at Christmas. In fact, it would be more correct to say: Especially at Christmas. It’s just one of those things.
Happy Holidays, secret_weapon from your Secret Writer!