LOVE CALLS YOU BY
YOUR NAME
“You thought that it could never happen to all the people that you became,
your body lost in legend, the beast so very tame.
But here, right here, between the birthmark and the stain,
between the ocean and your open vein, between the snowman and the rain,
once again, once again, love calls you by your name.” - Leonard Cohen
It was the riskiest thing
he'd ever thought to do. Even compared to defying his superiors, to trapping
Hastur in an ansaphone, to rushing toward the Apocalypse with his suicidal sense
of optimism. And even compared to taking up a tyre iron against a Certain
Someone. Nothing else he'd ever thought of doing would be as hard as this. And
he was going to do it, only two days after the Armageddon That Wasn’t.
Yes, he was going to do it.
And he didn't even fully comprehend why. Yet. Thinking too deeply about his
reasons tended to hurt his brain, so he just didn't bother. Somehow or other, it
would manage to work itself out.
Right?
Well, as it involved the
angel, of course it would. He just had to be brave for a few more minutes and
then things would... Again, he wasn't entirely sure.
Best to stop thinking
altogether and just do it.
Right.
He stepped out of the
Bentley and into the bookshop, then paused. Was he making a horrible mistake?
Hah. When hadn't he? And yet the universe always looked after Anthony J.
Crowley, for some inexplicable reason. A wise demon didn't look a flaming-eyed
gift horse in the mouth. Or any other creature either, since he wasn't fond of
horses anyway.
The angel looked up from the
dusty tome he was carefully repairing, and smiled his usual comfortable smile.
"Crowley, I was hoping you’d stop by. They have a new dish on the menu at the
Ritz I thought you’d like to try sometime, and was just thinking –"
"Er," Crowley interrupted
him hesitantly. "Actually, mind if we stay in tonight? I have, uh, something to
tell you."
From the way the demon was
fidgeting, hands in his pockets and biting his lip, the angel couldn’t have
refused. He gently set the volume aside, stood up and went to the tiny kitchen
area, knowing that Crowley would follow. Sure enough, while Aziraphale washed
his hands of glue and crumbly bits of parchment, he heard Crowley rummaging in
the well-stocked liquor cabinet behind him. When he turned around, the small
table in the center of the room was so covered with bottles and glasses that it
became apparent this was quite a large ‘something’ the demon needed to divulge.
Brows drawn, the angel took
a seat opposite his friend and filled a glass. Crowley was already well into his
third refill by now. Aziraphale downed the wine more swiftly than he would have
liked, completely failing to savour it or delight in the bouquet, so as to show
willing to keep up with the demon’s rapidly advancing inebriation.
After four bottles of good
wine, two harder liquors, and just opening a fine old whiskey, Aziraphale said,
"Sooo… whass this big ol’ somethin’ that becomes fassil- fasc- easier to tell me
by staying in and drinking so much?" He vaguely realised, for the millionth
time, just how very poor his syntax, diction and grammar became under the
influence, but couldn’t be buggered to care. "You in trouble, m’dear? They
sendin’ the hell hounds after you?"
"Nah, nothin’ so ssssimple
as that. Could throw a treat at ‘em, slow ‘em down. Marrow bone or somethin’.
Prob’ly m’own leg, hah," Crowley waved his hand and nearly followed its
momentum, then had to grab onto the table for what minor support it could
provide. Thankfully the weight of the angel leaning on the other side made a
good anchor. Thankfully also, he missed the look of utter horror and disgust on
the same weighty angel’s face at his words. "Nooo never ssso simple… No, this is
all… becaussse of you."
"Wha’s because of me?"
Aziraphale frowned, twisting his lips. "I didn’ get you drink, er, drunk. You
got yourself drunk."
"Not talkin’ ‘bout being
drunk. Was necsssessary for me to… to tell you what I… what I… can’t say the
wordsss otherwisssse…" Crowley stopped and swallowed hard, then ran his hands
roughly over his face, knocking his sunglasses off. They landed with a clatter
on the table, admidst the bottles, startling them both into looking at one
another straight on.
Aziraphale saw that
Crowley’s eyes were bleary. But they were also worried and nervous, with the
strangest glimpse of pleading hope just barely discernable. The cool reptilian
nature did not diminish their sudden eloquence.
The angel forced himself a
bit more sober. Crowley might not wish to face whatever he had to say without
the crutch of distilled spirits, but Aziraphale felt that he personally might be
better off quasi-coherent. He sighed. “Please, could you just tell me?" His hand
crept across the table, between bottles and over sunglasses, to pat Crowley's
hand. Then to squeeze it. Which seemed to make the demon even more nervous.
Crowley grabbed the nearest
bottle with his free hand, not bothering to wrest the other from the angel's
soft grip, and gulped burning liquid until Aziraphale thought he might drown.
Finally draining the bottle (particularly potent rum) Crowley gasped, eyes
watering, dropped the bottle on the floor and turned a wobbly gaze back to his
friend.
"M'gonna tellya summ'in,
ainzzzhul... tellya summ'nawannada tellya for for foreverago..." He blinked and
licked his lips, wondering why they wouldn't work properly. "M'gonna tell ya...
m'Real Name... m'gonna-"
"Crowley," Aziraphale
breathed so softly that he was sure the demon hadn't heard. His grip grew
tighter on Crowley's limp and heated hand. This was indeed very important. His
human heart began to pound like a rather amateur garage band percussionist.
"Down B'low... no one ussses
Real Namesss... sss’too dang’rousss... can hurt ta... ta hear it when they...
when... can be usssed against ya..."
"Yes, our True Names are
precious," Aziraphale whispered, fingertips caressing the demon's palm tenderly,
encouraging him.
"Sssso when ya Fall... ya
change it... leave it b'hind like ya... left Heaven... ya know?"
"Yes, I can imagine."
"But sometimesss... ya still
hafta use it... ya gotta ssssign it sometimes... bind ya to something ssspecial,"
Crowley panted with the effort of telling his story, while fighting off the
demonic instincts screaming at him to shut up about such a personal thing. "Hadda
sign it when they gav’me the Antichrissst... an' I buggered that up good...
ssstill gonna hafta pay for that one… someday… maybe." He gave a short barking
laugh that was so far removed from real humour that it could have made Joey
Grimaldi slit his wrists (not necessarily a bad thing).
"Oh Crowley, I really don't
think you-"
"But if I tell you," the
demon interrupted, looking straight into Aziraphale's eyes, that look of
pleading and hope more apparent now, "if you ssssay it... you can... bind me…
here…to you… maybe... sssave me..." Then the golden eyes closed tight and his
head dropped forward, landing on the cushion of their joined hands and
scattering nearby bottles onto the floor.
"Oh dear," Aziraphale said.
He began to understand the full ramifications of what Crowley was suggesting,
possibly better than the demon himself understood, especially in his current
condition. And the pounding of his heart went to Broadway and joined the cast of
Stomp.
He
was long familiar with the need to disguise his name from mortals, who
wouldn’t understand or be able to cope with saying his True Name
aloud, with all its power and connotations. Fortunately most of them
also didn’t possess the ability to pronounce it well enough to
harm themselves. But he still employed variations, for simplicity's
sake - Ezra Fell being the best of the lot, and A. Ziraphale being the
laziest of efforts and therefore most frequently used. His True Name
was actually Izrafael [1], but years of being around humans had
flattened the consonants and slurred the vowels so that it wasn't
nearly the same. Crowley knew his Name, he was certain of that.
Regardless, Aziraphale was still an angel and therefore didn't need to
hide his True Name from others of his kind. And not even from a demon.
He was a Principality, more powerful than most of those Below. He could
not be harmed by his Name. It already belonged to God, as
did he.
But the awful harshness of
the Fallen, how they’d been cast away and fled from the Light and everything it
represented. How they’d renounced everything, even their True Names, which must
then be hidden away if only because reminding themselves of it caused such pain
and resentment. The pain of being so far away from God.... Aziraphale could only
begin to imagine how empty and lonely, how very awful it was.
Yet Crowley...
wasn't as far from the Light as he pretended.
The demon raised his head
just an inch, enough to bring his mouth away from the table so he could speak. "C'n
I... tell ya m’Name, Aziraphale...? Can I... trust you?"
"My dear boy," Aziraphale
said softly, brushing the dark silky hair away from the flushed face before him.
"Do you even have to ask such a question?"
Crowley made a sort of
sniffling noise, rubbed his eyes again, and shook his head. "No, jus'... jus'
checkin'..."
"Though perhaps... I should
ask you a question, if you're capable of answering," Aziraphale said. "Why on
earth are you telling me this? Why now?"
Crowley's face got a sort of
twisted look, as he tried to unscrew the words from his brain and force them out
of his mouth. "S'no more Apopa- Apolac- End of the World. Prob'ly. Hope so. 'Nless
it starts again. Don’trust ‘em not to someday. An’ an’ an’ then we're both gonna
be in shhhtrouble. Gotsum people mad at us, eh? Well, if I tellya m'Name and
you... you have it... then... they can't take us away fr'm... fr'm each
other..."
Aziraphale felt a sudden
leap inside his chest, and realised that Stomp had changed over to Riverdance
without warning. "Oh, my dearest… Crowley..."
"Ssss'not Crowley. Um...
m'Namessss..." He hissed, paused, took a huge bolstering breath and tried again.
"Name issss... Gaaaadrrrrree'eelll..."
Aziraphale nodded. He actually knew the Name. A very few humans knew
it as well, but it was scarce knowledge, usually conveniently lost
through mistranslations and omissions to key volumes. Curious, that.
Almost ineffable. When it was mentioned at all it was often
misspelled, thus losing even more potency. But when it was documented,
it was referred to as the name of the angel who had tempted Eve. The
Fallen angel, that is. [2]
Carefully, pulse tapping a
calmer rhythm now, Aziraphale said, "Crowley, I am deeply honoured by your
trust. And I would never abuse that trust, of course. But... is there...
something else that you want of me, having told me your Name?"
Slowly, as though coming out
of a trance, Crowley raised his serpentine eyes to the soft, caring ones of his
friend. His friend, a real one. The only one, ever. He'd had to numb himself to
near-comatose with booze just to get out the words he'd already slurred. All he
could do was make a vague and shuddering nod.
"You want me to... to speak
it? In... our own language?" Aziraphale said gently, knowing that if this was
true, it was a tremendous leap of faith on the demon's part. And neither of them
knew what sort of reaction it would cause. At worst it would hurt Crowley, and
of course Aziraphale would instantly stop and make profuse apologies. At best...
well, actually he wasn't entirely sure what would happen.
The dark head bobbed once
more, and the yellow eyes squeezed shut again.
Trembling a bit, as nervous
as the demon was, Aziraphale took a gentle breath that stirred the unseen aether around
them. And when he exhaled he said:
∞☼
Gadre'el
☼∞
He pronounced with a soft
trilling of the consonants, a wispy breathiness of the nearly invisible vowels,
and further qualities that could never be reproduced by human throats. Said in
its original language, by the mouth of an angel, the Name itself became a power.
It flowed over and into
Crowley, past his human ears and into his very essence. With a violent shudder,
Crowley moaned, eyes rolling back into his head, arms outstretched as though he
was being pinioned to a rack.
Aziraphale stopped
instantly, and stood up in alarm. "Crowley? Are you all right?"
A shuddering whisper was all
the demon could manage, as his head swam. But he said, "Yesss... more..."
Hesitantly, Aziraphale
walked around the table and stood behind Crowley, ready to catch him if he fell
off the chair. He took another gentle breath, and spoke again:
∞☼
Ghaadhrrieel ☼∞
And Crowley's wings erupted
with a rush of air, spread to their maximum length, taking up the entire room
with their blue-black shimmering beauty. He was almost entirely undone, gasping
and groaning, writhing under the sound of Aziraphale's voice. He felt the Word
burning inside him, the Name ensnaring his ancient angelic core and wrenching it
free of the Darkness, which had only been Somewhat Dimness but no less scary and
powerful. The shining center of his Being trembled, begging for more, calling
out without words, without sound, to the angel next to him.
Aziraphale knew now what had
to be done. He knelt beside his dear friend, who was seized with such tremors
that it seemed his very frame would break apart. Stroking the shining wings,
kissing the damp forehead, then putting his lips very near the demon's ear, he
inhaled once more, and blew the soft breath directly into Crowley's soul:
∞☼
Gkhaaaadthrrrrriiiieeeeelll ☼∞
Crowley gasped in pain and
ecstasy, his body arching upward as his spirit lurched against its fleshy
prison. Wings beating weakly, he groaned piteously as Aziraphale stroked his
sweating forehead, whispering words of less power, trying to soothe the torment.
With a gesture, the angel moved his friend to the dingy sofa, which became three
times as wide as normal, laid him down and sat beside, continuing to comfort.
"There, there. I know it's
difficult. Shall I stop? What do you wish me to do?"
Crowley gingerly opened his
eyes a slit, but he was unable to see clearly. "Az... Aziraphale... I'm goin'
blind... s'all blurry, misty..."
"It's tears, dear."
Disbelieving, Crowley raised
an unsteady hand to his face, found it was wet and warm. "Huh," he said softly.
"S'never been like that before... they always... usually burn... hurts..."
Not liking to think of
someone causing his friend to cry at all, let alone tears of acid pain,
Aziraphale flicked his thumb gently along Crowley's cheek and wiped them away.
"These are pure tears. Healing tears." With a pause of realisation, he said,
"Angel tears."
"So... so, what then? I'm
crying out... what's left of the angel in me?" Crowley sounded uncertain.
"No... no, I think the angel
within is crying from happiness," Aziraphale said very softly, kneeling beside
Crowley again, his face only inches away. "…Don't you think so?"
And it was true. It was
disgustingly, sappily, angelically true. The hidden angel inside him,
half-buried but never quite dead and gone, was sobbing with joy, reaching out to
the other angel in the room. The one who had spoken his Name and brought him
forth from the Still Slightly Scary Dimness.
Crowley reached up, touched
Aziraphale's ancient, familiar, slightly pudgy face, and thought it was the most
beautiful thing he'd seen since Heaven itself, and infinitely more interesting.
He pushed up the last inch and their lips met like the oldest of friends,
softly, comfortably, naturally.
Aziraphale melted into the
kiss just as much as Crowley did, and when he found his hands unhurriedly
removing neckties, popping open buttons, sliding beneath clothing to find warm,
smooth, delightful, somehow familiar skin, he didn't even question it. Just
because it had never happened before didn't mean it wasn't the exact, perfect,
right thing to do. The kisses were slow and gentle and thorough, and only broke
apart long enough for a Name to be spoken again, and to feel Crowley tremble
with need beneath him.
And now he truly was beneath
Aziraphale. They were naked in their human bodies, one trim and fit and
handsome, one softer about the middle but not at all unpleasant, and Crowley was
still crying wordlessly. There was no language possible for what he was feeling
now. So he let Aziraphale lead the way.
Both ethereal and human
bodies clung together, sweating and stroking, sliding and grasping. Mouths
whispered Sacred Words that echoed in the chambers of their very Beings. Tongues
described odd patterns on flesh, spelling Names upon each other, branding them,
binding together something that was already bound but in an infinitely more
intimate way. And when their bodies came together, entering and welcoming,
rocking and grinding, they shook the Heavenly Spheres with voices that rang out
as One at the pinnacle of earthly pleasure. Wings thrashed wildly, pushing to
get closer, to soar higher still, as the apogee threatened to rip them free of
that mortal flesh and send them flying in a very real way.
Both were nearly catatonic
while they gradually regained control of themselves. Eventually, two sets of
reasonably human eyes opened and regarded one another with fresh insight. This
was followed by very human blushing. As they arranged their bodies more
comfortably side by side on the now-sanctified sofa, slowly adjusting to the
newness of the experience, and contemplating the profundity of Name calling
during sex... they both began to smile.
Utterly sober now, Crowley
whispered, "Wow... uh... that was..."
"Yes, my thoughts exactly,"
Aziraphale said with a tired smile. "Never did that before, you know, but it
was... yes. Wow, as you say."
"Not ever? Really?" Crowley
inquired, looking both awed and flattered. "Um... Lust. It's not going to make
you Fall now, is it?"
Aziraphale chuckled
knowingly. "My dear, how can an honest expression of love cause an angel
to Fall? Cite me an example."
Opening and closing his
stunned mouth, Crowley blushed again.
"Exactly. Now... what shall
we do about your condition?"
"My what?" Crowley said
blankly.
"It seems that you've got
something in your eyes."
"Probably dust. This place
is horrid, you know, and what with all the crying I've been doing..."
"And your wings."
Crowley blinked. He lifted a
wing and coughed in alarm. Then he sat upright and flapped them in disbelief.
They had lightened, losing darkness as his soul had done. The old glossy
raven-black was gone, reduced to blue. He was no longer a flash bastard that
even other demons envied and reviled. He looked at Aziraphale with shock and
dismay clear on his face.
The angel grinned, aware of
the rather transparent thoughts. "Just take a moment to get used to them. Shake
them out a bit. Better yet, get a mirror, would you?"
Whimpering at the thought of
having lost his looks, Crowley snapped his fingers, conjured a full length
mirror and stood up.
Oh.
He was still beautiful in
all the best human ways. But his wings weren't a mere blue. They were shimmering
sapphires, shot through with soft turquoises and heavenly teals. Here and there,
the light caught something darker, a shining indigo as deep as the ocean and as
gleaming as amethyst. He was lovelier than any peacock. And ten times sexier.
Though he might have to
adjust his wardrobe to reflect the change. Ah well.
Stepping closer to the
mirror, he saw the eyes were still amber. Golden really. A rich, warm, gold that
looked like sunlight shining through a clear pot of honey. And his pupils.
Round. Both honey-gold orbs were welling with fresh tears of disbelief,
happiness, and a strange sense of regret at losing his snakey eyes. They had
been so uniquely his for millennia. And yet... these were also quite
uniquely his. Gold.
Silver eyes looked up at
him, brimming with love, and it didn't scare him anymore. It didn't hurt to
think about it. And he had thought about it, many countless times, for nearly as
long as he'd known Aziraphale. His friend had been the only thing of Heaven he
could touch, and those touches had become increasingly frequent over the years,
though still chaste for fear of harming the angel, making him Fall.
But now. Oh... now.
He could touch, taste, and fulfill every desire they both may have. And it was
all right. He wrapped his miraculous wings around himself, and thought how
beautiful it would look with Aziraphale's gleaming-beyond-white feathers
intermingled...
Aziraphale lay waiting on
the sofa, smiling and patient, but only for so long. When Crowley continued to
stare into the mirror, fascinated by his new/old eyes, Aziraphale reached over
and wrapped an insistent arm around his slim waist and pulled him back down.
"Crowley," he said with gentle chastisement, "Vanity is a Sin. Do you really
want to saunter back Downward so quickly?"
Crowley grinned at the
angel's lack of subtlety. "Aziraphale, if you wanted another shag, all you had
to do was say so." Losing themselves briefly in another kiss that touched levels
unseen, Crowley whispered into Aziraphale's mouth. "What am I now? Am I an angel
again?" He didn't know yet if he was Redeemed. Didn't know if such a thing was
possible, unless one went before Him and was granted Forgiveness, but something
had clearly happened. There wasn't much of Hell left inside Crowley. And yet
there was still a fun sense of wickedness, and that had been there since before
he Fell.
"I don't know," Aziraphale
said between kisses and exploring fingers and gasps of pleasure, "but I do know
one thing..."
"Hmm?" Crowley murmured,
mouth full of all sorts of delicious fleshy bits that he could easily suck on
for eternity.
"Ah, yes... You are mine,
dear" Aziraphale breathed heavily as he was embraced and filled and loved.
"And... I am yours. Oh yes..."
And the rest would sort
itself out.
Elsewhere, there was a
beautiful, ineffable Smile.