Thank you and a commentary on Innocence and Experience

[louiselux]

I had a wonderful birthday. Thank you to everyone who sent birthday wishes my way - I felt very loved and spoilt. And daegaer wrote me this fic (eeee!), which is the funniest thing I've read in an age. You'll never think about Crowley and his Bentley in the same light again.

I read a wonderful reworking of a fairy tale yesterday: Lubberkin by gehayi, a rewriting of Rumplestiltskin. It's beautiful, elegant and haunting.

And now, at long last, I've managed to finish the talk-through of Innocence and Experience, my first go at the Aziraphale-and-Crowley-have-sex story.



Innocence and Experience

The title comes from William Blake, fount of fic titles.

Crowley was staring at him open-mouthed.

'Whatever is the matter with you, my dear? It's not beyond the bounds of possibility is it?' Aziraphale asked, blushing hotly.

It wasn't that unexpected, surely. He hadn't quite expected Crowley to be so surprised, and the dumb-struck expression was lasting a little too long for comfort.

Maybe these first two paragraphs are slightly over-egged, but I wanted to get across Aziraphale rather prim, defensive embarrassment.

'Not really,' said Crowley eventually, shaking his head. He gulped a large mouthful of whisky. 'Wow. I just never thought, er, that you would ...' He picked distractedly at the loose threads on the shabby armchair. 'Was it, er? Did you … ? With a human?'

Crowley is a bit thrown here. He doesn't really think Aziraphale's being having it away with another heavenly being, but he just has to ask. He's morbidly curious about the revelation that Aziraphale has had sex

Aziraphale crossed his arms self-consciously. 'With a woman, yes.'

'Oh. A woman? Really?

'What?'

Aziraphale is defensive here. I find it hard to believe that Aziraphale isn't aware of what people think of him, ie, that he's gay. It makes me think that he either can't help being incredibly camp or he does it on purpose. He knows perfectly what Crowley's surprise is meant to signify. He doesn't liked having fun poked at him

'Nothing. Was she, um, nice?'

Crowley is treading carefully here. Asking if she was nice is purposely innocuous and not really what he wants to know at all.

'Very nice.'

'Right.'

Crowley went back to his drink; Aziraphale watched him carefully over the rim of his glass, waiting for the inevitable.

'What was...?'

'Can we...?'

They both spoke at the same time. Aziraphale sighed. He wasn't going to get out of this conversation very easily.

'Sorry,' Crowley said, gesticulating with his glass and spilling whisky on his trousers, 'you carry on.'

Aziraphale poured them out another large drink and hoped for the best. 'I was just going to say could we drop the subject, please?'

'No way. I want to know everything.'

Crowley is teasing Aziraphale here, partly. He really does want to know everything, but he won't force Aziraphale to tell him. Much.

'Crowley!'

'OK, OK, we'll drop it. Just tell me one thing.'

'All right, one thing.'

Crowley looked thoughtful for a minute and then he asked, 'What did it feel like?'

'What did what feel like?'

'You know, it. Sex.'

Aziraphale stared at him blankly, and then realisation dawned. 'You mean you.... Oh. Oh right. So you've never, er, you know, done it?'

It was Crowley's turn to look self-conscious. Aziraphale's surprise turned rather swiftly into amusement.

'No. And stop smirking like that, it doesn't suit you. Bastard.' Crowley glared into his glass.

'It doesn't matter you know. No one's going to think the less of you.' Aziraphale's shoulders were shaking with laughter.

'Fuck off.'

'Yes, quite. Never mind, my dear. Have another drink.'

So, Crowley has never had sex. Aziraphale has. This was a quick and easy way to turn a fandom cliché on it's head, and I was quite surprised that no one had done it already. When I posted this on the CA list, most feedback, whilst being quite complimentary, said that they couldn't imagine Crowley, being a demon, never having had sex, or not knowing much about it. I think Crowley likes people too much to experiment on them for his own gratification. Yes, he's a demon and he tends to think of himself as intrinsically bad, but he never actually harms anyone, and the bad things he does do, like the M25, are one step removed from actual one on one tempting. It's never occurred to him that Aziraphale been walking around all this time having actually done it. So now he's intensely curious, and of course at the back of his mind is the idea that they could have sex. But he's not really aware he's thinking that until later. .

*

He had been determined that he wasn't going to let it bother him. So Aziraphale knew something he didn't. That was just fine. No reason to get competitive about it. But the idea niggled at the back of Crowley's mind. He ignored it as best he could, and he swore to himself that there was no way he was going to ask the angel anything about it. Ever.

'So, Aziraphale,' Crowley enunciated with great concentration, interrupting the angel's long and rambling story about some boring book or other, 'have you done it recently?'

This is like the classic comedy cut, when you see someone promising they'd never do such a thing, then see them straight afterwards doing the very thing they promised never to do. In the gap between Crowley has been getting more and more curious. At this stage he just wants to know all the ins and outs (er) of Aziraphale's past love affair, partly because he's never had sex himself and is curious, partly because he's very nosy and doesn't like to think Aziraphale has a secret.

It was some weeks later and they were in the angel's back room again, sprawled in Aziraphale's battered armchairs. The meal had been lengthy, many bottles of wine had been drunk, and more alcohol had seemed like a very good idea. He realised that Aziraphale was staring at him.

'Done what?' Then, 'Oh no. I thought we weren't going to discuss it anymore. You promised.'

'Can't blame me for being interested, can you? Never tried it. Not like you.'

It was true, Crowley realised, he was interested, and for a reason that, at the moment, seemed to elude him. He looked over at Aziraphale, whose skin had flushed pink, whether from wine or conversation Crowley couldn't tell. Funny, he'd never noticed until recently how often the angel did that.

That last sentence doesn’t work for me now - it was meant to flag Crowley's increasing physical awareness of Aziraphale. Crowley's view of him is changing; Aziraphale was a sexless being and now he's not. I think it needs a bit more detail to work properly, but then the story would have to be a bit longer.

'So, what happened with her?'

'Who?'

'You know, your lover.' The words sat uneasily together in his mind, but he swept the thought aside.

That seems a clumsy set of mental images now. I'd change that.

'What d'you think? She died.'

Aziraphale doesn't really want to talk about this: he tries to shut him up by confronting Crowley with the bald truth that any human lover they took would eventually die. Her death must have been painful for Aziraphale. I didn't want too much detail about her: it's better if she reamins in the background.

'Oh. Of course. Sorry.' Crowley paused, dimly aware that the conversation had taken a sudden downturn. He carried on. 'No, what I meant was, was it just once, or,' Crowley paused again, groping for the right phrasing and failing, 'or a lot?'

'We had a few years together. She died young. I never bothered again, after that. Never really been interested enough.' Aziraphale stared pensively into his glass.

Aziraphale's affair took place around 3000 BC. I didn't really have clear idea at first about his human lover and what she was like, but Daegaer suggested that, even if it wasn't in the story, I should have some idea of who she was and what happened between them. And you know what? That's bloody good advice, and something that I've done in all my subsequent stories, so thank you. *g*. Inventing back story for your characters, even if you never use it, seems very important for understanding who they are and what they might do. Anyway, here's what I thought: he was lonely, she was rather demanding and wouldn't take no for an answer and of course he'd be too polite to say no. He enjoyed the sense of comfort she gave him - she was probably a really good cook. She looked after him in a motherly sort of way. She died young. I don't think Aziraphale thinks about her much these days, but he was very fond of her and her death was painful for him. He's never been tempted to try it again. Of course, he's not so lonely any more because he has Crowley.

'Oh.'

They sat in silence for a while, and Crowley drank some more for good measure, wondering how he could get Aziraphale to spill the beans.

'So, what was her name?'

'It doesn't really matter,' Aziraphale said, with a sigh.

'When was she, er? When did you … ? Was it a long time ago? Did you live with her?'

It can't have been that recently, Crowley thought. He was sure that he'd have noticed if Aziraphale had been shacked up with someone.

Recently, as in the last 2000 or so years, when they began seeing more of each other. They'd need to keep in fairly close touch to keep the Arrangement working smoothly, and before that they'd have to have spent quite a bit of time together; they'd have to know each other well enough for the Arrangement to be a viable option.

Aziraphale just looked at him and sipped his drink in manner that said shut up. Crowley realised that he really didn't want to.

Hearing about Aziraphale's past affair, his love, is becoming more important to Crowley, and I wanted this to be quite clear to the reader. It's to let the reader know that Crowley has more than a passing interest in the subject of Aziraphale, sex and love. I also wanted to show that Crowley isn’t really aware that he even has this interest (which has been around for a while), but at around this point it starts to dawn on him that there are possibilities he may never have thought of before in their relationship. Aziraphale certainly isn't aware of it. He just thinks Crowley is being nosy and a bit offensive.

'Aziraphale....'

'Look,' Aziraphale interrupted him, 'you could go away and try it, and then you could stop pestering me to tell you about it.'

Alcohol surged triumphantly through all points of Crowley's brain, making some very persuasive connections with the idea that had been lurking patiently in the background.

'Aha! You're wrong y'know. Not tell, exactly.' He lurched upright, making Aziraphale jump. 'I want you to show me!'

This doesn't please me anymore - to my slightly more experienced eye Crowley's decision needs more motivation, or at least more internal thought on his part, I think. This story was written for a challenge where every story had to involve alcohol and characters being drunk, hence the pivotal point where it's being drunk that allows Crowley to see what he really wants to do - a loosening of inhibitions I suppose. It works all right, but it could be better.

He watched in fascination as Aziraphale coughed up a surprising amount of wine.

'What?' Aziraphale managed to choke out after a few moments. 'D'you mean what I think you mean? Me? With you? Er.'

Crowley watched Aziraphale's eyes widen. He couldn't tell if it was with shock or horror, but he was sure they'd get round it, whatever it was. He nodded encouragingly.

He is a demon who thinks positively, after all

'Now look here. It really was a long time ago and, and... ' Aziraphale floundered.

'Why not? M' nice looking aren't I?' Crowley said, getting up and swaying towards Aziraphale.

'Well, yes, you are, but, you're, you're you. Crowley. I mean. I mean. It'd be, just, odd,' the angel concluded, shrinking back in his chair as Crowley approached.

'What's wrong with odd? Odd's fine. You're odd. Anyway, m'nice-looking, got my own car. You're lucky, really. Could do a lot worse.'

'No, absolutely not.'

*

Crowley had insisted that they go back to his place, which was only sensible because Aziraphale didn't have a bed. The trip in the Bentley had been even scarier than usual, and Aziraphale was starting to wonder if this was a good idea. It had seemed an increasingly attractive proposition when he'd found himself backed into a corner by a very inquisitive Crowley, and he'd realised that it really had been an extremely long time. He gazed around Crowley's stylish bedroom, feeling very out of place.

Da-dum. It's the comic cut again, but this time it's Aziraphale who's decided to do exactly the thing he swore he wouldn't, ie, have sex with Crowley.

It took me ages to get that preceding paragraph into a form that made me happy. I couldn't decide where they should be when they have sex, but finally decided it should be Crowley's place, merely because he has a bed, and I could get in a scary trip in the Bentley during which Aziraphale has time to mull over what he's agreed to. Being in Crowley's 'stylish bedroom' is a rather alien environment for him, and adds to his discomfort.

'We should sober up really; otherwise you won't get the full effect. I don't want to have to repeat myself.'

Crowley's face fell a bit at that, but Aziraphale ignored the twinge of guilt. Well, it was his own fault; Crowley was the one who wanted this. They both winced and staggered slightly.

'There, that's better. Far more conducive to intimate relations.'

Aziraphale tried a cheery smile, but couldn't help but notice that his words had made Crowley wince again.

Mmmm, Aziraphale, you charmer. 'Intimate relations' was the least sexy euphemism I could think of for sex. Maybe I was influenced by 'Intimate Books', the name of the porn shop next door to Aziraphale's bookshop in Soho. Aziraphale is not being very nice to Crowley here and it's partly a reaction to his own discomfort and partly because he's just not used to being nice to Crowley. Having sex again seemed a good idea at the time, but the scary trip in the Bentley gave him time to mull it over. I wonder if you can tell how good a lover a man is by the way he drives? Oh dear.

'Right, so, er.' Crowley was at a loss as to how to continue.

That statement could be construed as a POV slip and could very easily be fixed by inserting 'obviously' between 'was' and 'at'.

'You're quite sure that you want to do, um, it, then?' Aziraphale asked.

He eyed the demon doubtfully. He didn't look particularly like he wanted to do it, as far as Aziraphale could tell, and he didn't want to go to all the bother of getting in the right mood and taking his clothes off, if Crowley was just going to change his mind.

A little indication that Azirapahle is lazy. He's more than a little grumpy here, but all that's about to change.

'Of course I bloody well want to do it. I wouldn't have suggested it otherwise, would I?'

'No need to snap, my dear. No, I suppose not.'

There was an uncomfortable silence.

'Right.' Crowley ran his hands distractedly through his hair. 'So, we, um. What now?'

Aziraphale thought for a moment. Something vital was missing. Oh yes. He carefully hung his jacket on the back of the chair, closed his eyes very briefly, and remembered. He thought of sex, and how he wanted to feel all the things a human felt, to have all the needs a human had. He caught his breath as it all came back to him, and his heart began to pound.

I like this paragraph of what it might be like to have to 'make the effort'. Here Aziraphale's portrayed as almost having to 'switch' something on to make him feel desire. I'm not quite sure what though, or how an angel's consciousness of itself in the world differs from that of a human being. I imagine an angel or a demon can see, touch, taste, hear and smell exactly like a human being. Where they differ is in their motivations: humans are driven by chemicals to make them reproduce and angels aren't. So sex is going to make little sense to them. Angels don't need to eat, drink, sleep, have sex or read, unless they decide that they want to. And if you're on Earth and those pleasure are available, why would you not want to, eventually, if you were a sensible angel? (Or demon?)

'Well, I'm ready,' Aziraphale lied, clasping his hands together primly. Clasping them, he had to admit, a little too hard.

'You don't look ready. Aren't you forgetting something?'

'Eh?'

'Clothes, angel.' Crowley scowled.

Oh dear, thought Aziraphale. This wasn't going very well at all. He took a deep breath as a thousand long-forgotten sensations tingled across his skin, and tried to relax. Everything was so distracting. The room was too cold, his clothes were suddenly uncomfortable, and far too tight, and to cap it all when he looked at Crowley he became aware of an ache that seemed to start in his toes and finish somewhere at the tips of his hair. He didn't remember it being quite like this before.

That's supposed to imply that his old lover had never make him feel quite like this, which is understandable really. He has a completely different sort of relationship with Crowley than he did with his old lover

'Perhaps we should start slowly, er, with a kiss. It's quite traditional.' He saw the look of horror dawning on Crowley's face, 'or not,' he continued hurriedly. 'We can just get undressed, then.'

He quickly bent his head and tried to concentrate on his shirt buttons. He glanced up in time to see Crowley's clothes vanish.

'Oh.'

He looked very good. Good enough to eat. Aziraphale couldn't help staring. Crowley blushed so hotly that Aziraphale could feel the heat radiating off him in waves. Warm, Crowley-scented air twined itself in tendrils around his nose, sending him slightly off-balance.

There's a mention of food- I thought it made sense for Aziraphale to link sex and food. That last sentence is actually the very first line I wrote and it was for a different story all together, which has long since been cannibalised for its parts.

'You could bloody-well get a move on, you know,' Crowley said, diving under the covers. He lay staring at Aziraphale with just his head poking out from under the blankets.

Aziraphale couldn't remember taking the rest of his clothes off, just a steady yellow gaze that was practically burning a hole though his skin. Abruptly he wondered if Crowley found him attractive, and was immediately struck with a horrible awareness of his own body. Surely he'll see past all the outer trappings, Aziraphale thought, a little desperately.

The non-descriptive description of Aziraphale, as daegaer called it. This might be a good time to describe how I see Aziraphale. Sort of plump, about 40, quite tall, blond hair, a bit wavy, nice grey suit two-button English suit and quite possibly a pink tie. I always imagine a pink tie. He's always properly accessorised with glove hat and scarf if they're called for. He has nice skin and hair and nails. He always looks smart.

'If you don't hurry up and get in, I'm going to have to get out of bed and kill you, you do realize that don't you?'

Crowley's voice didn't really fit with his words; it was lower than it usually was, with a definite tremor. Well, Crowley was probably nervous. First time and all that. Aziraphale finally peeled off the last of his clothing, wishing his own palms would stop sweating, and that his heartbeat would slow down a bit. He took a deep breath.

'Sorry,' he said, advancing slowly towards the bed.

It seemed to take a long time to get there, what with Crowley watching him so intently with his suddenly-mesmerising eyes. He had the most peculiar sensation that he was outside his body, observing the unfamiliar, naked Aziraphale. There he was folding back the covers and getting into bed with Crowley. There was Crowley, lying back on the pillows and breathing too quickly. There they were, lying side by side. The sheets were cold too. He shivered a bit and pulled the blankets up to his chin. Crowley turned to him impatiently.

Lots of little physical details in these few paragraphs to highlight the flood of sensation that Aziraphale is experiencing. Through his painful awareness of Crowley, we can pick up how Crowley's feeling, shown through the shaky voice and quicker than normal breaths.

'Well? Are we just going to lie here?' Crowley's eyes were yellower than ever and he looked a bit twitchy.

'Er, no, of course not. There's no hurry, is there?'

The mattress dipped. Crowley's quick breaths gusted in his ear, and he shivered from head to foot.

'Yesss,' Crowley hissed, reaching for him.

*

'No, not like that,' a pause, 'more like this.'

'Like that?'

'Yes. No. Ow! Stop, quickly, stop. Oh, this isn't working!'

Anal sex the hard way, ie, with no clue what you're doing. This bit is suppose to be very unromantic. The working title of this story was 'Awkward' and it was intended from the first to be about how ridiculous and difficult sex can be. Difficult, awkward but if you stick at it and practise it gets better.

'Sorry.' Crowley pulled back in frustration and looked down in puzzlement at Aziraphale, who was sprawled in an ungainly heap on the bed. 'I thought you said you'd done this before?'

'Well, loosely speaking, yes. Get off. I'm very uncomfortable,' Aziraphale's voice floated up, muffled by the pillows.

He rearranged himself more comfortably on the bed, wincing slightly. Crowley settled down next to him and twined his arms round the angel's waist. Skin was a marvellous invention, really. He couldn't seem to get enough of Aziraphale pressed up against him. He wriggled closer.

Crowley is quite the innocent here: just indulging in sensation. He's not thinking very deeply about how Aziraphale might feel, or the effect that his words might have on him. Aziraphale has experienced the pitfalls of sex before with his previous lover, so is on the defensive.

'Sorry. I haven't done this very much, you know,' Aziraphale admitted at last, sounding more irritable than apologetic.

Crowley made a soft humming noise in his throat and pulled back a little, so that he could peer into Aziraphale's eyes.

'I never exactly had you pinned as the world's greatest lover,' he said, grinning.

'I have a perfectly adequate knowledge of the necessary, er, techniques,' Aziraphale said huffily, frowning at him.

Crowley raised his eyebrows.

'Oh yeah? That's not what it looked like just now.'

He wriggled against Aziraphale some more, testing the effect.

'Look, I'm not the one who's never done it before, all right? You were the one who was so keen on this, not me,' he said waspishly, struggling out of Crowley's arms. 'Don't blame me if you can't do it properly.'

'Well, you seemed to be more than eager back there, so I can't have been doing that badly.'

There was a pause while they glared at each other.

'I'm sorry, but do you want to do this or not? It was your idea, after all. We really should be concentrating, otherwise what's the point?'

'I am concentrating, you're the one with the performance problem.'

'I should never have agreed to this in the first place,' Aziraphale snapped, shoving Crowley off and sitting up.

Crowley had to admit that the conversation wasn't really keeping things going in the right direction. He shut his eyes and lay back, thinking. No one spoke for several long, awkward minutes. Eventually Crowley reached out to trail his fingers slowly down Aziraphale's spine.

'It was good, what you were doing before,' he said softly. 'Before we tried the other thing. I mean, it was really good. Can we just do that?'

There was no response so he reached out and dragged Aziraphale to his side, and the angel let himself be pulled close. Crowley put his lips to Aziraphale's ear, liking the shivers it produced.

'Show me how you do that thing again,' he murmured, remembering to let his tongue flick the inside of Aziraphale's ear.

In the preceding para there's a repetition of 'ear' that I'd alter if I were going to rewrite this. The ear thing is there because it shows a change in Crowley: he's realising that sex isn't that easy to get right that and he begins to think about what Aziraphale might like.

'What thing?' Aziraphale asked, rather breathily. 'You'd better remind me.'

Crowley slid his hand between their bodies and stroked carefully.

'Oh...that,' Aziraphale managed to gasp.

Soon after, Crowley was hopelessly lost in a tangle of kisses and the press and slide of skin on skin that seemed to go on for ever. He surfaced eventually with Aziraphale on top of him, flushed and panting. The angel smiled devilishly.

'I rather think you're getting the hang of this now.'

Sex! Not very much, but it's definitely sex. I was very wary of writing them having sex - I couldn't think about how to do it without jarring the reader horribly and I knew that it wouldn't be very detailed and it wouldn't involve words like 'cock' and 'fucking' because it's the wrong tone for these characters. I'm also not sure I could write that convincingly. But really, the main reason the sex isn't more detailed is that it's not actually the sex that's so important, it's the sharing of an experience and the trust that comes from that.

*

'So that was it,' Crowley said.

Aziraphale bit his lip and looked over, anxiety creasing his brow.

'Er. Did you, um, like it?'

Crowley turned on his side to look at him. 'Does that always happen?'

'Does what always happen?'

'You know, at the end, the big crescendo?' Crowley waved his hands in the air to illustrate.

It had been very amusing watching him discover that, and the mopping up process afterwards.

I mean, if you didn't really know about sperm, you'd get a shock, wouldn't you?

'Oh.' Aziraphale smiled, 'Yes, mostly. It's sort of the whole point. Apart from babies, obviously. Sometimes it doesn't happen.' He remembered a long-ago stream of complaints, and some angrily delivered lessons on the female anatomy.

'I think it has quite a lot to do with how you're feeling at the time, and skill as well.' He eyed Crowley warily, but Crowley just smiled and nodded back at him. 'For humans it's a bit like it is for us; they have to make an effort too sometimes. It's not all plain sailing, this sex thing.'

'No. I can see that.'

Crowley looked thoughtful for few minutes, and Aziraphale couldn't help noticing that Crowley looked much nicer when he was relaxed; the sharp angles of his face seemed softened and his eyelids drooped lazily, like a cat's.

'So, you always have one, do you, a thing?'

'They're called orgasms, and, well, yes. Usually.'

'Oh.' Crowley went back to gazing at the ceiling. 'So, what happens after this?'

'Um, well, from what I remember, you each say to the other what a nice time you had and perhaps you hug, too.'

I rewrote this line a few times, trying to think objectively what it was human beings did after sex, usually.

Aziraphale thought that it didn't sound like very much, when you put it like that. He remembered the whole after-thing being rather addictive at the time, almost as good as the sex. He looked over at Crowley doubtfully. He didn't particularly look like he wanted to embrace or swap compliments, and Aziraphale definitely wasn't going to be the first to suggest it. In fact, he thought it was probably a good idea to get up and just bypass the whole tricky area, but as he swung his legs out of bed Crowley lunged at him and pulled him back, pinning down his shoulders and then sitting on him for good measure.

'Crowley, what are you doing?' he yelped, wriggling.

'Where do you think you're going?' Crowley smiled suggestively. 'I haven't finished with you yet.'

This is Crowley's way of saying: 'That was wonderful darling'.

*

'D'you think we should get up?' Aziraphale asked drowsily, his face buried in Crowley's neck.

'Probably,' Crowley replied, yawning.

He was almost too relaxed to move, but they ought to get up, really. Crowley wasn't sure what time it was, or day. Or month actually, come to think of it. They hadn't got out of bed for a very long time.

This little exchange sets up the idea that they've become very comfortable with one anther physically, and the tickling suggests Crowley's intimacy with Aziraphale's physical reactions. They've been in bed for a long time, a comically long time. That comes from the idea that the passage of time must seem different to them, being immortal, they might spend much longer doing things then humans would. In the book, Crowley seems to think about the centuries as if they are years. I suppose they don’t have the same stamina problems as humans either.

'Suppose we should get back to work,' he said, running his hand gently down Aziraphale's side until he reached the ticklish bit and squeezed. The angel jumped.

'Mmph,' Aziraphale mumbled, slowly extricating his limbs from Crowley's and sitting up.

Aziraphale looked quite comical, with his hair sticking up in all directions. At the back it was all tangled into knots, just like Crowley's. He slid his fingers into Aziraphale's hair and it fell smooth again. Then he yawned again, hugely. Time had certainly gone by in bit of a blur since they'd first got into bed. Aziraphale had dredged up quite a surprising number of things from his memory, and Crowley had nearly always demanded repeat performances, just to make sure that he'd absolutely got the hang of it. They'd also come up with a few inventions of their own, of which Crowley was rather proud. He definitely wanted to try them out again one day. Apart from the time in the sitting room. He hadn't liked that much; it felt like the pot plants were mocking him. But everything else had been good. It really was quite an addictive pastime. Probably as good, if not better, than driving the Bentley very fast down a very busy road, and Aziraphale seemed to enjoy it more too. A thought struck him. He prodded the angel in the ribs.

I really like the line about the pot plants. It's so silly. In this paragraph you can see that Crowley's being rather self-deceiving : Crowley had nearly always demanded repeat performances, just to make sure that he'd absolutely got the hang of it. He doesn't like to think that he needed to do it again, or was giving in to his desires wholly. This sort of denial is set off by mention of tender actions like playfully ticking Aziraphale and smoothing his hair for him.


'So. That went well, I thought.'

'Stop poking me.' Aziraphale said, swinging his legs over edge of the bed. He paused as he did and looked warily at Crowley. 'You're not going to jump on me again, are you?'

Crowley just smiled and shook his head. 'Too knackered. But it did go well, didn't it?'

The tone of this last part is purposely fairly flat: there are no great outpourings of love or emotion. I wanted to get across a feeling of ease between them. If I was writing this again, I'd up the intensity of this scene slightly, with maybe just a line showing Aziraphale being happy and smiling at Crowley perhaps more sappily than he intended.

Aziraphale shot him a knowing glance and got up. 'Crowley. I know what you're after.'

'No you don't. What?'

'You want to know if you were better. I like to think I know something of the human, and demon, ego.'

'Well?' He stared after Aziraphale's retreating back, now clad in a brand-new woolly tartan dressing gown.

Aziraphale has been a bit naughty here and conjured a dressing gown from the firmament. It's a slippery slope. Sleeping with demons, dressing gowns...

'Oh, my dear,' Aziraphale said, smiling, over his shoulder, 'there's really no comparison.'

Aziraphale is a terrible flirt, really. This ending is purposely ambiguous, because I think it's more fun that way and it leaves you all guessing. But also because the image of Crowley sitting up in bed frowning and being frustrated by the the ambiguity makes me smile, and it's nice to see Aziraphale getting his snark back. Aziraphale's last line could mean quite a few things: Crowley wasn't as good as his previous lover, Crowley was better, Crowley is too different to compare.

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[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

I kind of want to read that. I'm going to HELL!