雨山

Summary:

Crowley and Aziraphale coming to China and celebrated Lunar New Year together.

Notes:

I know it's lantern festival today...forgive me hahaha
Again, not a native speaker so bear with me for the language mistakes.

[Appoximate reading time: about 6-10 min]
This was actually inspired by a weird dream.
And I am dedicating this work to my recent emotional breakdown. Hope everyone can find their Crowley or Aziraphale!

Now sit back, relax and enjoy. It's HE and this really is the ride to the kindergarten(hhh)

Pupils dilated, shrinking the golden perimeter around. Hands placed on the cold surface, palms sweating slightly. Crowley looked into the mirror. It was a giant mirror, and quite clean, he noted. He stared and stared into his own eyes, leaning in. His eyes traveled down to his cheekbones in the reflection, then his slightly sunken cheeks, then the lips. That's all he could see now. A pair of lips. Wouldn't it be nice if they were Aziraphale's? His angel had that kind of lovely, cute, red-as-rose lips. They were so close now he could literally kiss them. His accelerated exhales created a small shade of fog that hid the lips from sight, but he could almost feel them waiting there, waiting for his next move. So slowly, he closed the distance between them. 

And it was cold on the lips. Freezing, chilling coldness. But it was also hot, like a burning sensation that hurts a lot. It's like... holy water. 

He peeked through his eyelashes to see the mirror turning into a pool of holy water, slightly rippling due to his touch by the lips. Now his reflection was twisted. The water trembled as if the vertical threshold suddenly no longer existed and the gravity took control. Then... 

His eyes snapped open, forehead shining from a thin layer of sweat. 

"Shit."

Crowley got up, mumbling under his breath complaining about the cold weather and the air conditioner that seemed to be on a strike. While he was brushing his teeth the weird dream suddenly sank in and he stared at his reflection with a mouthful of white foam, lost in his trail of thoughts. 

At some point the phone rang, pulling him back to reality. Aziraphale's joyful and energetic voice soared through the wire, "Hi dear, I was wondering we could get on the same plane...?"

Crowley spit the foam out and picked up the phone, "Why would I want to be on the same plane with you, Angel? "This is somewhat strange because usually he's the one bringing up things they could do and Aziraphale often just went along with it.

"You know, people can be quite annoying on a plane..."Aziraphale sounded a little bit taken aback by Crowley's bluntness, but his voice was especially cute when he was not getting what he wants. Crowley smiled at the empty air before him, and... 

He opened his eyes. Again.

It was a dream. A dream that's inside a dream. It was so vivid, he thought, at least I could take some hint...

So he snapped a finger, booked two first-class tickets next to each other on the plane to China this afternoon. The plane takes more than 10 hours, and they could spend a night on the plane. It seemed quite unlikely that those supernatural creatures would ever be bothered by jet lag, but Aziraphale insisted on the schedule.

He had absolutely no idea as to why they were going to China. It's clearly not because of a surging religious trend, and he could sense that it would never happen. Crowley could never have thought of, not in a thousand years, that their bosses wanted to have a vacation in London and would like to get him and his "Angel" out of the way.

They were lying on their back watching different movies quietly. Crowley tried to start some conversation, but Aziraphale had something else on his mind. He was rubbing his chubby baby hands together in a way that he did when he gave Crowley the holy water decades ago. Crowley couldn't possibly think of anything that could tense him up like this. They have gone on a trip together for many many times, too many that he lost count. 

"Did you know that China has something called "Lucky Bag"? I heard it's similar to fortune cookies, so I guess they are really into those kinds of things...huh..." His voice trailed off.

Crowley swallowed back the correction that lucky bag was, in fact, originated in Japan, and simply replied, "We can get one if you like, you know."

Aziraphale's eyes lit up. "That would be lovely, thank you, darling. "

Then they fell back to silence.

It was when Crowley thought about the dream again. He glanced over to see Aziraphale breathing shallowly with his eyes closed. His eyelashes flickered involuntarily. His mouth hung slightly open, and suddenly as if the demon inside him was awake from a long, refreshing sleep, Crowley felt like a piece of iron drawn to the magnet.

Aziraphale woke to see Crowley staring at his face.

"Do I have something on my face? A cake crumb, for example?" He frowned, shifting in the chair trying to find his handkerchief, which was difficult with the dim light in the cabin.

"N...Yes. Let me help you." Crowley leaned in, brushed aside an invisible crumb at the corner of his mouth, and smiled. "There you go."

“Oh Crowley, that's nice of you..."

"Don't say that. I'm not nice." Crowley hissed through his tightly clenched teeth.

They arrived in the morning, still too early for the sun to rise fully. "What now? " Crowley asked casually with his hands in the pocket, swaying on his feet like he had no bones.

"Well...." Aziraphale had this look that Crowley had never seen.

"What did your lot tell you to do?"

"You know, hanging out here, doing some temptations and so on. Strangely, though, they implied me to go with you. That's a bit confusing."

"That's because...I'm the one you are supposed to tempt."

"WHAT?"

"And you are my mission too..." Aziraphale lowered his head, staring at his toes. "I figured this out on the plane. There's no other explanation. "

"Guess this won't be the first time we fail on our assignments, huh?" Crowley was amused.

"It's not funny, Crowley! You know what people in hell are like, for heaven's sake!" He shivered. It wasn't exactly a nice experience being Crowley. "And my lot is not as kind as they seem as well..."

"Chinese restaurants! "Crowley cut in. "Don't you always want to try some?"

"Yes, but..."

"Come on, let's worry about that later, shall we?"

The peckish Angel couldn't say no.

"It's really good. Are you really not going to order anything? How about trying some?" 

Crowley opened his mouth wide in response. 

"What?" He was slightly offended by Aziraphale's startled expression, "It's supposed to be a temptation. "

Crowley was pleased to have a mouthful of the porridge, and it did taste good. Maybe because it came from Aziraphale. 

"They don't have any fortune cookies! "Aziraphale complained, "I thought they were all about fortune and luck." He wiped his mouth with the napkin, almost satisfied by a proper Chinese breakfast. 

"Actually that's my invention, those fortune cookies." Crowley was amused by the shock on Aziraphale's lovely face, and shrugged his shoulders before going on."Thought it's' a good idea to give out false hope. Kind of works better than a real strike sometimes."

"Well, that's...." Aziraphale couldn't think of any adjectives so he decided to let the sentence hung in midair. 

"Do you know it's new year's eve? " Crowley asked casually, fingertips knocking on the table at a fast pace.

"Of course, but people usually celebrate it with their family, or so I heard."

"Let's celebrate together anyways. What do you say?"

"You are my family. "Crowley said in his mind. 

So there they were, sitting in a big hotel room, which certainly didn't look like a hotel room anymore. From ceiling to floor, there were red decorations everywhere, on the table sat two cups of wine and delicious Chinese cuisine covering all the space. They had been drinking, of course. 

"It's....it's almost new year."

"hmmm?"

"Come on, let's go outside. There will be fireworks."

"What?"

The drunken Aziraphale was pushed to the balcony. Then he saw it. Gigantic, gorgeous fireworks that lit up the whole neighborhood. The red light felt warm despite the cold wind. 

Then he noticed Crowley stepped next to him. His hand reached out to hold his angel's. 

They stood silently watching the show with their hands clenched together until the last blast died into silence. 

"Happy new year, Angel."

"You too, dear."

"I love you. You know that, right?"

"Crowley..."

The demon held his breath for the blow. 

"Of course I know. "Aziraphale eyed him with disbelief. "I'm an angel, after all."

"And?"

"I'm afraid we are hereditary enemies. An angel and a demon, huh?"

"...."

"I do love you though, my dear. "

Crowley looked down on their hands.

He smiled.

Then he suddenly remembered. There was a dream, right?

Turned out Aziraphale's lips tasted better than he thought. Way better. The soft touch and the slight scent of red wine almost drove him out of his devil's mind.

They parted lips. Aziraphale smiled back. "What took you so long to say it?"

The demon shrugged, and then he said, "In this case, I think I just did a favor and helped both of us complete our mission."

"And we have a two-week vacation ahead of us."

(Fin)

Thanks for reading! If you like it please tell me or comment below! It would mean a lot to me, honestly.