Years later, it surprises him how little really has changed, since the night that he and Aziraphale promised themselves to one another: how little notice Heaven and Hell seem to take of them, content that things are going along like they should as time marches on ever steadily towards Armageddon. Crowley doesn't trust surprises, views them with a great deal of suspicion, in fact--but he's not one to poke a nest of sleeping vipers either (he should know not to, being their cousin) and if Beelzebub and the others think all is as it should be on earth, so much the better. He keeps the holy water carefully sealed away, checking on its hiding place now and again to be sure it hasn't gone and evaporated on him or any such thing, brooding over the possibilities as decades wear on and the Antichrist at last arrives. When he does, it seems only natural to enlist Aziraphale's help.
The boy Warlock needs a nanny, his house needs a gardener: they fall into their roles together, and tending to the Dowlings' household means that they can virtually live together, as long as the nanny is not discovered in flagrante delicto in the gardener's bed. At night, when the Dowlings are asleep and the protection detail are looking the other way, Crowley steals into the gardener's cottage on the estate, where he and Aziraphale shed their disguises. Sometimes Crowley sleeps, sometimes not; he longs for those hours with Aziraphale, a quality of desperation to them as though they grasp for what time they have left before the end of the world.
That night he does sleep, because the next the Dowlings will be off on an early flight overseas, and so there's little for Nanny Ashtoreth to do after tucking young Warlock into bed. Which means he can wake with Aziraphale, linger for hours with him instead of stealing back early to the main house. He supposes Aziraphale may have some gardening he ought to be getting on with--then again, Crowley had a rather emphatic word with the landscaping before going to the cottage the night before, so the flowerbeds won't dare be too demanding. Dawn comes, light flooding the cottage, but Crowley only buries his head in the pillow, determined to wring as much enjoyment out of a late morning as he can.
for lunchbreaks
The boy Warlock needs a nanny, his house needs a gardener: they fall into their roles together, and tending to the Dowlings' household means that they can virtually live together, as long as the nanny is not discovered in flagrante delicto in the gardener's bed. At night, when the Dowlings are asleep and the protection detail are looking the other way, Crowley steals into the gardener's cottage on the estate, where he and Aziraphale shed their disguises. Sometimes Crowley sleeps, sometimes not; he longs for those hours with Aziraphale, a quality of desperation to them as though they grasp for what time they have left before the end of the world.
That night he does sleep, because the next the Dowlings will be off on an early flight overseas, and so there's little for Nanny Ashtoreth to do after tucking young Warlock into bed. Which means he can wake with Aziraphale, linger for hours with him instead of stealing back early to the main house. He supposes Aziraphale may have some gardening he ought to be getting on with--then again, Crowley had a rather emphatic word with the landscaping before going to the cottage the night before, so the flowerbeds won't dare be too demanding. Dawn comes, light flooding the cottage, but Crowley only buries his head in the pillow, determined to wring as much enjoyment out of a late morning as he can.