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“Hold still.”
Aziraphale huffed and shifted on his knees.
“Hold. Still. ”
“Dear, I really don’t see the point—”
“Do you want me to stab you in the eye?”
The angel looked up to stare at him incredulously. “Do I want you to—”
“No? Great! Then stop. Moving .”
Aziraphale grumbled and rolled his eyes, but he sat back on his heels and let Crowley lean in to continue lining his eyelids. “You know, angel,” Crowley said carefully, nudging Aziraphale’s face to the side where the light was better. “You could’ve leaned into this whole immortal look when you got here, if you wanted. It, ah. Suits you.” Aziraphale opened his mouth to speak, but Crowley poked him sharply in the shoulder. “If you start talking now you will end up with kohl in your hair, I swear to Heaven, Aziraphale, this is a very delicate process.”
“I just—”
Crowley waved the brush towards his face in a clear threat. Aziraphale stopped talking.
He worked in silence for a bit. This was the tricky bit, the wing, where the liner swung out past the eye in a decorative sweep. It took concentration even when he did it on himself, and he’d had decades of practice at that. Aziraphale’s skin was a new challenge, different in its give and smoothness, different in the way the brush pulled or glided or tugged. It didn’t help that he was so close ; how was he supposed to think straight when he could smell Aziraphale’s soap, and feel his breath on his hands?
The brush nearly slipped, and he cursed under his breath. The kohl was such a sharp contrast to Aziraphale’s pale skin, one little wobbly line would show clear as day. Refocusing, he drew over it again. There . Even, smooth, perfect. Worthy of the face it adorned, now.
Crowley sat back to see the full effect, and had to stop himself from gasping aloud. Aziraphale looked breathtaking . The blue of his skirt brought out the warm pink of his skin, and the gold jewelry Crowley had (gently) bullied him into just drew attention to his wrists, his hips, his beautiful soft collarbones. He was absolutely stunning, and Crowley let himself stare, mouth slightly agape and eyes wide. He could sit and look at this vision for centuries .
After a moment, Aziraphale’s forehead creased, his mouth drooped into a little pout, and he cracked one eye open. When he saw Crowley had moved away from his face, he gave up pretending to be still. “My dear?”
“Ngk!” Crowley quickly forced his expression to cooperate already and shifted to turn away. If he looked at Aziraphale much longer he just might start burning.
“Is it done, then?” Aziraphale asked, and Crowley glanced over just in time to grab his hand away from his face.
“Hell’s sake, angel, I just finished that, don’t touch it!”
“I just wanted to see—”
“You’re gonna see it by smudging it all over your face? ”
“Oh, don’t be dramatic, it can’t be that bad.”
“You wanna test that? ‘Cause really, angel, be my guest, but—erk—” It was right then that Crowley realized he was still holding Aziraphale’s wrist, and he dropped it like his hand was burning as badly as his face. “Ah… er, any—anyway.” He turned away more fully this time, desperate to get the flames in his cheeks to shove off and leave him alone . “I’ll just, um. Here, yeah, just hold on a moment, I’ll do mine and then we can… uh, yeah, just a sec, won’t take long I can—”
A soft hand landed on his arm, and he froze in his tracks. “Let me.”
“...what?”
With gentle fingers, Aziraphale turned him back around. “Let me do it.”
Heaven, his eyes were lovely, he couldn’t so much as breathe in the glow of those eyes, how the hell was he supposed to string words together? “Ngk, that’s—er, I mean—I don’t—”
Suddenly there was a kohl brush very close to his face. “Hold still.”
“What—ANGEL! ” He smacked the brush away. “Do you even know how to do it?”
Aziraphale shrugged, being frighteningly careless about where the brush was and coming very close to spilling the pot in his other hand. “I’ve seen you do Moses’s how many times now? It’ll be fine, my de—”
“You’re gonna get kohl all over me! This is a new skirt, and I just washed my hair, I’m not having you—”
“Dearest.” Aziraphale had no right sounding as amused as he did. “I promise I will not get kohl on your skirt. Or in your hair.”
“You… but you don’t…”
“I let you do mine. Let me do yours.”
Crowley protested, and then grumbled, and may have whined a little in between, but after enough eye rolling and scoffing to last most humans a decade, he settled down and let Aziraphale start to paint his eyelids.
The kohl was cool against his skin, but Aziraphale’s hand cupping his jaw was warm even through the heat of his blush. He was so gentle, smoothing the creases beside his eye with his thumb and tucking his fingertips just behind Crowley’s ear. If Crowley hadn’t been so tense, he might have melted right where he sat.
And then he couldn’t stop himself from melting, because Aziraphale lifted his face to the sun and brushed his hair out of the way, and then he didn’t stop, just kept carding fingers through his hair with one hand while the other dragged kohl along his lashline. It was still so new, the touching each other thing, and it nearly stopped Crowley’s heart every time.
Aziraphale’s thumb skated over his cheekbone, and Crowley revelled in the fact that he could feel the softness of his hand against the edge of his smile. He did it again, and then he whispered.
"Oh, you beautiful thing.”
Crowley’s eyes fluttered open before he could remember they were supposed to stay closed. Aziraphale was sitting back a little, the brush still in his hand as he gazed at Crowley with such solid intensity the demon really and truly thought this might be what the humans who went to heaven felt when they got there.
But then Aziraphale shook himself, and took a breath, and the intensity was gone. “Sorry, darling,” he said, leaning back in. “Nearly done, just close your eyes for me again.” And Crowley was left to desperately hope he wasn’t close enough to hear his heart trying to hammer all the way through his chest to reach him.
“...angel?” Crowley eventually said, when he thought he’d be able to speak without his voice cracking. He still couldn’t, as it turned out.
“Hmm?” Aziraphale responded, paying special attention to the corner of his left eye.
“I, um. I meant it. Earlier, when I said… when I said the, ah, that the immortal look suits you. It does, it, um, ngk. You—angel, you look really really good.”
Aziraphale hummed in response, and Crowley was so relieved he hadn’t burst into flame saying those words that it took him a moment to realize the angel sounded… unconvinced. Aziraphale’s hand ran over his hair again. “You’re too sweet, dear.” He tilted his chin again, angling his face to the side, and Crowley went willingly even as he raced to catch up with what Aziraphale meant. “But you’re the one who was meant for this, with your hair and your beautiful long legs and your cheekbones… You’re perfect as a deity, Crowley, much more so than I could ever be.”
Crowley’s eyes flew open. “Wait, angel—”
“There we are, all done.” And Aziraphale was pulling away, scrambling back and leaving Crowley behind. “I hope I didn’t… mess it up too badly.”
“Aziraphale—”
“Here, you should check it.” Aziraphale thrust a copper mirror into his hands. “Don’t worry if you want to fix it, I know I don’t really know what I’m doing, I won’t be offended.” Crowley wanted to throw the mirror back into the void and take Aziraphale’s hands instead, get them to stop twitching and yanking at his skirt and make him look up from the ground and understand how absolutely serious Crowley was. He almost did it, too, had the mirror in one hand ready to fling away, but then the sunlight caught and flashed on the metal and he glanced down, instinctively, and saw—
Oh. Oh, wow.
What the fuck made Aziraphale think he wasn’t good at this?
The kohl around Crowley’s eyes was flawless, all smooth lines and a perfect, slim wing at the corner. But that wasn’t even the half of it, Aziraphale had—heaven, Crowley never even did eyeshadow for himself, but Aziraphale had painted his eyelids a warm, pale green, fading lighter as it got closer to his nose. Green was never a color Crowley would have picked, for anything, but it—he liked it. Without even thinking, he knew he liked it. The shade made his eyes look warmer. Despite himself, despite everything, Crowley almost thought his eyes looked pretty like this.
“Aziraphale…” he said, not even trying to keep the awe out of his voice. “The, it’s, ngk. You—you gave me eyeshadow .”
“Oh, my dear, I’m so sorry, I got—a bit carried away, you can take it off, I just thought, with your hair—it looks so pretty in the sun, darling—” Aziraphale’s hands were locked on the fabric of his skirt, and he was looking anywhere but at Crowley. ”—and you, well, you picked a skirt that’s, that’s not black, for once, and I love the color, dear, that dark red looks absolutely lovely on you, so I just thought a little more color to tie it in with your eyes, because I really adore your eyes, so—”
"Aziraphale.” Crowley jumped forward, putting himself at Aziraphale’s side so he could reach out and turn his face to look at him. “Aziraphale, no, angel, that’s not what I meant. I love it.”
Aziraphale’s eyes went wide, the kohl outlines making them even bigger. “I… really?”
“Yes. Yes, angel. Thank you.” He let his hand slide down Aziraphale’s cheek, careful not to smudge the eyeliner. “And I meant what I said earlier. You look…” His voice caught on the word as his hand caught on Aziraphale’s jaw. “Angel, you’re bloody gorgeous .”
Aziraphale blushed, and heaven above, that just made his curls glow brighter. “Oh, my dear, I don’t know—”
“Oi! Let me finish.” That made him smile, at least, even if it was directed at the ground. “Aziraphale, you were made for this. Are—I mean you gotta be kidding me, angel, with your hair? Your hair looks like a halo most days, if that’s not ethereal I dunno what is. And fuck, you think my legs are good? Fucksake, angel, my legs are sticks . Your legs—heaven, Aziraphale, first time I saw your thighs I genuinely thought I was gonna discorporate. You’re absolutely beautiful.”
Aziraphale looked up, finally, and his smile, even if it was small, was enough to light up the whole of the earth. “...thank you,” he whispered, his hands no longer clutching his skirt but resting gently between his legs. “My dear, thank you. You’re so very lovely to me.”
Crowley leaned across the short distance to press a gentle kiss to Aziraphale’s cheek. The angel turned away, but he was really smiling now, a little secret smirk meant just for them. Crowley let his arm drop down to wrap around his shoulder. “I mean it, angel.”
He saw Aziraphale peer back at him over his other shoulder and felt a soft grin on his own face. “I mean it too, dear. I really do.”