#i accidentally cut of aziraphale's wing on one side and it is driving me ABSOLUTELY batshit (i hope it's not too noticeable!)

[carciinogen]

There's something so romantic about seeing One's true form....

[obaewankenope]

Absconding with Harry verse Part 4: Bake-Offs and Bees

Here on AO3!

Summary:

“Children are the future, after all. Need the future alive and well to do—well—evil or good, depending on what department you are.”

“Exactly,” Crowley nods. “So I had to step in. Protect a potential investment.”

Fic below the cut!

.

The meeting of Harry and Aziraphale, from Crowley’s point of view, goes a little like this:

“Hello, uh, Harry,” Aziraphale says, nervously, standing near the sofa Crowley had miracled into existence—replacing the original that came with the building and was sort of falling apart at the seams. “It’s very nice to meet you.”

“Hello,” Harry replies, just as nervously, sitting on the sofa with a glass of mixed berries fruit juice that is obviously nice considering how it’s close to empty. “Do you live with Mister Crowley?”

“I—uh—well—not—not really, no,” the angel replies, stuttering and spluttering over his words—tripping over his tongue due to nerves—and Crowley eyes the angel as a slight blush rises on those pale cheeks. “But—well, I suppose that—that since he stole you and you’re here, then—well—I suppose he does now?”

Crowley was too surprised at the questioning—hopeful—glance Aziraphale threw him to actually answer at the time, but Harry had resolved that problem by nodding and saying: “that makes sense” and that had been the end of it.

Sort of.

“So, angel,” Crowley says, leaning on the back of the sofa with a glass of wine in his hand. The miracled-TV is playing some sort of streaming show—Crowley had made sure it had every channel and streaming service available on it, ensuring that it was free and the charges would end up on some annoying politician’s bill instead—provides a nice background noise that elicits a sort of homely feel to the room.

Aziraphale has, as usual, a customary mug of hot chocolate in his hands as he sits rather stiffly on the other side of the sofa. The angel seems to be quite nervous judging by the way his fingers are playing with the wings of the mug and Crowley finds the sight quite fascinating.

“You haven’t explained to me how you came to steal a child, Crowley,” Aziraphale says, cutting off whatever Crowley was about to say. “I really would like to understand what I’m now complicit in.”

Crowley tilts his head, giving the angel a Knowing Look before he answers. “Not much to explain really,” he begins, “I was heading back from another jaunt down in Surrey—priest who was a little too close to quitting when he’d bring a good couple souls to hell with his hateful language—and decided to pass by the house of the kid who speaks Parseltongue. You know I don’t get to talk to that many who know it too—” he looks at Aziraphale who nods understandingly “—and well, I peeked through the kitchen window from the garden and saw his aunt hitting him with a frying pan. So I thought, ‘that’s not on that’ and intervened. You don’t hit kids. I don’t like that. So yeah. Didn’t think it was a good idea to leave him there either, so now he’s here. That about cover it?”

“Oh, oh my,” Aziraphale breathes, shocked. He takes an automatic sip of his hot chocolate—which Crowley notices is cooling and he flicks his hand to heat it up again—as he thinks. “I understand why you took him then. Hitting a child. Absolutely ghastly.”

“Mhhmm,” Crowley agrees. “No point hitting a kid unless you’re a nasty piece of work. Even demons have limits, you know?”

“Oh yes,” Aziraphale plays along—falling into the usual routine they have over jointly-ignoring-Crowley’s-bouts-of-not-very-demony-demoning-behaviour. “Children are the future, after all. Need the future alive and well to do—well—evil or good, depending on what department you are.”

“Exactly,” Crowley nods. “So I had to step in. Protect a potential investment.”

“Of course.”

Crowley ignores the mocking humour in Aziraphale’s voice, choosing instead to be a Mature Demon and take a large mouthful of his wine rather than responding to the angel with a scowl. The silence falls between them and both angel and demon turn their attention mostly to the TV, noting the show is The Great British Bake-Off[1].

“I suppose we will have to live together,” Aziraphale says a little later on like it’s the most reasonable thing to say in between the episodes when it most certainly isn’t.

“What?” Crowley splutters, after nearly choking on his wine—it was far too good a vintage to actually choke on it so Crowley didn’t, but it was a near thing—giving the angel a genuinely surprised look. “Angel, what?”

“Well,” Aziraphale says, taking a small sip of his hot chocolate—he’s miracled it hot again so many times it might as well be called hot hot chocolate—before continuing, calm and reasonable. “It seems like the reasonable thing to do. Young Harry is going to need guidance from above and below—especially since he lives here. I can’t very well have you live here with him alone; there would be talk[2].”

“Angel,” Crowley growls and Aziraphale shushes him.

“Quiet Crowley! Harry is asleep in the next room! No raising your voice because you’re annoyed with me.” Aziraphale gives him a sharp look that, unfortunately for Crowley, works wonderfully in making him calm down so he doesn’t disturb Harry[3].

“I can’t live here, angel! It’s dangeroussss!” Crowley hisses, and he scowls more. Stupid lisp. “We’re not meant to be seen together; what if someone from our respective offices comes and checks up on us?”

And here Crowley is, actually arguing against something he honestly wants because he’s a paranoid, scaredy snake. Typical.

“We’ll have warning, we always do,” Aziraphale reasons and Crowley scoffs.

“You forget what happened in thirteen-twenty-nine then did you?” he asks, mockingly. Aziraphale scowls at him now. “Thought not. It’s too dangerous angel.”

“But,” Aziraphale says, softly, “Harry wants it.”

Crowley sighs. That—that is a very low blow from the angel. He’d think that Aziraphale Knows about him but Crowley has been ever so very careful to cultivate his image and he maintains it ruthlessly. Yes, okay, not to the point of ignoring children or people who are hurt, but he doesn’t actively endanger the illusion of a demon with No Memory Of Before like this.

Usually.

“You really are a bastard, angel,” he says, slumping down in the sofa with a defeated expression. “That was a low blow, even for you.”

Aziraphale—the smug bastard—just smiles at him. “It really was, wasn’t it?” he says, pleased because Crowley has agreed and the angel knows it.

“You are so lucky I like you,” Crowley mutters, flicking his hand at the TV. Aziraphale’s little gasp of complaint is ignored as The Great British Bake-Off becomes one of the worst horror movies ever created: The Bee movie[4].

“I’m still not sorry,” Aziraphale admits, an hour later, head tucked into Crowley’s side where he’d shoved it after ten minutes of the film.

Crowley just smiles, safe to do so since the angel can’t see it where he’s burrowed in the demon’s side. “Neither am I,” he replies.

This is their relationship in a nutshell. It’s one that Harry will appreciate more and more every day, especially the day he turns eleven and receives a letter via owl that declares him a wizard and to attend a magical school in Scotland. He does not, however, appreciate the hissing-cursing from Crowley when he reads the name of the headmaster for the school. Aziraphale is none-too-pleased either, though he does avoid cursing in front of Harry—the angel chooses instead to accidentally turn Harry’s waffles into pancakes cut in the shape of a wizard’s hat with obnoxiously brightly coloured stars and moons on it. Aziraphale refuses to explain what that is about and Harry wisely doesn’t push the issue.

That is how life for Harry James Potter—absconded by a demon from Number Four Privet Drive at the age of nine—is already wonderous before he even hears of Hogwarts.

His friends will never believe him when he tells them he has an angel and a demon for uncles. He can’t wait.

[1] Crowley tried to claim credit for the show when reports of wannabe bakers and cake makers attacking each other over their icing technique reached hell, but the positive aspects of the show resulted in him admitting that he was only responsible for the idea of the show not the execution. That he laid at Aziraphale’s feet. It’s one of the achievements that heaven considers Good since it allowed quite a significant number of souls entry to heaven because of altruistic actions by said souls through cupcakes and other baked goods.

[2] The type of talk Aziraphale means is not, as you would expect, talk from heaven or hell. It is, in fact, more talk from his neighbours. They have long assumed Aziraphale to be a bachelor with no life except his books and the sudden presence of a child in his living space above the shop would induce them to Question Him. In Aziraphale’s mind this is far worse than heaven asking after a child living with him. At least heaven can be distracted with a memo or two of miracles; Aziraphale’s neighbours aren’t quite that easy to tame.

[3] Although he could easily miracle it so that Harry will not wake up no matter how loud they are, the fact that Harry is magical means that Crowley isn’t entirely certain it would work. Not with the instinctive magic magical children often perform. Crowley suspects that an absence of noise and other signs of life outside the confines of wherever Harry is sleeping would be anxiety-inducing—thus his magic would naturally seek to reduce the anxiety by countering whatever miracle Crowley performed to keep the child from being disturbed by his and Aziraphale’s antics. In short, he can’t make Harry not hear them because then Harry will want to hear them and that will cause Problems later on.

[4] The Bee movie isn’t, technically, a horror film. It’s impossible for it to be one on its own merit. However. The fact that the internet has collectively decided to be traumatised by a film wherein a woman falls in love with a bee has produced a lot—and I say a lot, reader—of material that is just too disturbing to consider. Crowley loves the entire chaos the film has created and took even greater pleasure than he would otherwise have done in exposing Aziraphale to it all by switching out one of his beloved books with a print out of every comment, piece of art, and reddit page relating to the film. The angel still twitches whenever he sees a book about bees.