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A potential global apocalypse was bound to have a few complications. There were the plagues, sure, and the mass extinction of all of Earth’s creatures– not to even mention the sea levels. But one snag of the impending Second Coming, one that Crowley couldn’t quite tell if he would classify as a good snag or a bad snag, was that it forced him and Aziraphale to work together again.
Currently, the two of them were meeting at the bandstand in St James Park, and Crowley thought he might rip his own hair out. He’d just said something remarkably clever and hilarious about the other’s ridiculous status as the Supreme Archangel , and Aziraphale was, decidedly, not taking it very well.
“You don’t think that I can do this,” Aziraphale accused. “You assume that I’ll fail, that I can’t save Heaven– that nothing there is even worth saving. Need I remind you that you said the same thing about Gabriel and Muriel?”
Crowley rolled his eyes and smirked. “I said it once and I’ll say it again. I understand things a lot better than you think I do.”
Aziraphale’s face betrayed nothing; he barely reacted to Crowley’s low blow. “So you’ve said,” he replied coolly, and Crowley stifled a flinch. “Is it really that hard for you to understand that I could be capable of doing something that doesn’t involve you?”
Crowley only stared at him venomously. Now it was Aziraphale’s turn to roll his eyes. “That’s what I thought.”
The condescension made something in Crowley’s blood boil, and he snapped, “You left, angel. Left me . There’s nothing you can say that will change that.”
“I don’t want to change that!” Airaphale shot back.
Crowley’s eyes widened in shock as he fumed, “What.” It wasn’t a question.
“I am not an extension of your will, Crowley.” Aziraphale’s jaw tightened. “I do not exist to be agreeable to your plans. I am my own person, with my own ambitions, not…” he scoffed indignantly. “I'm not your love interest! ”
Crowley sputtered, his mouth refusing to form any semblance of words. “I-I never— that’s not—- I never said that y—”
“No. You didn’t. You didn’t have to,” Aziraphale snapped, and Crowley knew him well enough to know that the angel was furious . “Lord, you just— I am not stupid. Or naive. It’s me who understands more than you ,” he jabbed a finger in Crowley’s direction, “think i do.”
Aziraphale took a deep breath, and Crowley got the sneaking suspicion that it had less to do with steadying himself and more to do with exercising restraint from hitting Crowley with a chair. Not for the first time, the demon remembered what Aziraphale was capable of with a sword, yet he couldn’t find it within himself to be afraid.
“I have accomplished things in Heaven. Can you even comprehend that? Can you even consider that this might be something I’m good at?” Aziraphale asked without pausing for an answer. “I have gotten other angels to question Heaven and express interest in learning how to be good outside of their standards,” he said. “I have gotten rid of their reprimand system that punishes those who try to do ‘too much good’. I have convinced many of them that the Second Coming is not as glorious or necessary that they have been led to believe. I have taught them the value, the beauty, in humans rather than facilitating an environment in which all of Earth’s inhabitants are looked down upon.” Aziraphale glared. “I am capable, and I am right for this, and what I am doing is important .” He took another breath. “I will not apologize for taking this job. I will never apologize for taking this job, because if I hadn’t, then all of that–” he gestured behind him as though a physical list of all he’d managed to do in Heaven was right there in the park, and for a moment Crowley believed there would be– “would never have happened. Heaven would have gone exactly how it’s always been, never undergoing the change it so desperately needs, and when such inherent injustice exists in the world, what kind of person would I be if I was given the chance to change that injustice but I ignored it?”
Aziraphale huffed indignantly. “It’s all very nice and good to abandon the system entirely, to claim that it’s broken and therefore must be destroyed, but that kind of anarchy is not bloody realistic. Heaven simply is not going to magically implode. It’s there, and it’s real, and people are suffering every day because of it! Change doesn’t happen overnight. It happens progressively, and only when people put in the work to do it! To abandon Heaven just because it no longer directly affects me would be selfish. An act of privilege. I have to at least try.”
Aziraphale rolled his shoulders back. “I should not have said what I said to you that day,” he admitted. “I shouldn't have called Hell the bad guys, or assumed that Heaven accepting you would heal you the way it would have healed me. But. That did not give you the right to call me the things that you did, or to reject the very idea of me making my own choice and claim that I left when it was you who left first!” It was, without a doubt, the angriest Crowley had ever seen his friend.
Said friend wasn’t done. “I am not a punching bag,” he shot, “meant to roll over and let you behave however you like because ever since you Fell you need to get your anger out somehow. I won't be your outlet.”
Something hard and heavy that felt like anger but also suspiciously like guilt settled in Crowley's gut. “That isn’t fair.”
Aziraphale was pacing now, his volume growing to the point where humans enjoying a nice walk in the park must have started to notice. For once, the angel who tried so hard to blend in with humanity didn’t seem to care.
“For God’s sake, Crowley!” he burst, throwing his hands in the air. “Nothing about this is fair. Heaven nearly destroying me for thousands and thousands of years— that wasn’t fair. And neither was what Hell did to you, of course it wasn’t. But claiming you had the high ground when you didn’t go back when they offered?— that wasn’t fair, either. You didn’t go back to Hell because Hell wouldn’t have given you the chance to change it. It’s as simple as that. Hell is an evil place because it is supposed to be an evil place. It is supposed to be the ‘bad guys’. It functions exactly in the way that it’s supposed to. But Heaven is every bit as awful, only they were supposed to be good— they promised to be good… for humans and angels alike. They were supposed to be, but they never, ever were.” His shoulders shook for the smallest moment before tightening. “Hell may be a functioning abomination, but Heaven is broken. It’s broken and I was put in a position to do something about everything,”— his voice cracked— “everything that was done to me, and the worst part is that you know it! You knew that was what I meant when I called Hell the bad guys, and you knew that I could make sure no one has to go through Heaven again, not the way it is now, with their belittling, the—” his face darkened even further, looking almost haunted by whatever memories plagued his head– “mental and physical abuse of their reprimands, all of it. I needed to do that, not just for them but for me, too.”
At Crowley’s silence, Aziraphale’s brow pinched angrily as he said, “Goodness, if you can make the self-preserving choice, to not come with me and to choose your own path, then why the fuck couldn’t I?”
Crowley physically jumped at the swear.
“Why do you get to do what is best for you, and my subsequent obligation is to also do what’s best for you?” Aziraphale demanded. “Because that is what you implied that day. It is bad enough that every time I mention trying to change something in this world you don’t think I’m capable of it, but to say it outright— to call me an idiot for it— where in God’s name do you get your nerve?”
It was as if words were physically stuck in Crowley’s throat. He had never felt so inappropriately matched for a conversation in his life, like he’d shown up to a political debate with no preparation whatsoever and decided to ‘wing it’ against the best speaker in the league. “I didn't mean it like that,” he said lamely.
“I'm sure you didn’t. Really, I am,” Aziraphale replied. But it sounded like a dismissal to both of them.
The angel was quiet for a long moment, and Crowley didn’t think he’d ever seen him so… sure of himself, so confident in his argument. Try as he might to deny it— not that he tried very hard— Crowley was proud of him. He almost broke the silence, maybe to argue or maybe to do something else, but then Aziraphale looked right at him, his gaze piercing. Crowley flinched under his… anger? Exhaustion? Both? Someone, Aziraphale always looked tired, like he was carrying more than he should have been physically able to and definitely more than he should have been asked to, but Crowley couldn’t recall the last time it had visibly looked this bad.
“Neither of us have gender,” Aziraphale said finally, pulling the demon out of his thoughts. It hadn’t, at all, been what Crowley was expecting, and he floundered for the right thing to say.
“Er… right,” he settled on.
Aziraphale appeared not to hear him. “I know that,” he said. “And you know that. But I think…” he trailed off, and for a second Crowley thought he wouldn’t go on. But then he let out a long sigh and said, “Somewhere along the line, you started thinking of me as your damsel in distress, the one you’d have to rescue or– I don’t know, ‘protect’ .”
Crowley barely managed to restrain himself from clarifying that it was never, ever out of any sense of ‘having’ to.
“And— well,” the angel gave a humorless chuckle. “Even when I try to hide it, I am aware that I am… obvious, shall we say, when I'm overly sad, or anxious, or excited. I don't believe that’s much of a secret.
“But those things— needing help or showing one’s emotions, I mean— they’re things that are associated with femininity. Things based in stereotypes that assume that a woman is inherently weak, or that to simply be human is to not be a real ‘man’.”
The angel shook his head. “I have no problem being seen as feminine, mind you. None at all. And I am not, by any means, calling you a man. But haven’t you ever noticed that a woman can only make an independent or… or ‘ career-oriented’ choice if she has the consent, the,” he scoffed, “the permission of her partner? Anything else and she’s calculated. She’s manipulative. She’s abandoning her relationship even though her commitment to herself should be damn well enough of an explanation.”
Aziraphale’s eyes bore into Crowley as he said, “She is the antagonist of her own story, and her significant other is never held accountable for not believing that she can be a leader, for believing that she is obligated to prioritize his happiness above her own and put her love life above all else.”
Aziraphale tilted his head thoughtfully. “I think that you got it in your head that to choose myself, to choose something that was right for me and maybe not for you at the time, meant that I was forgoing ‘Us’. Gender aside, you forced me into the same box that men force women. You were allowed to make a so-called ‘selfish’ choice, to stay on Earth rather than go to Heaven, and saw absolutely nothing wrong with it. Choosing yourself, I mean. Even if it meant running away from the chance to help countless people, even if it meant turning a blind eye to systemic injustice, you were allowed to choose yourself.” His voice took on a bitter note. “But I wasn't allowed to do the same. You didn’t let me do the same.”
Mixed in with the anger in Aziraphale’s voice was hope, desperation, even, like he was praying he could get Crowley to understand. “I couldn't be Supreme Archangel and help end the cycle of abuse that I was a victim to even though that made the most sense for me, to help me… heal, I suppose, from what I went through at Heaven’s expense.” He stuck his chin out almost defiantly. “I have just as much of a reason to be burdened with memories of what Heaven did to me as you do. It took me a very long time to realize that, but I do. And I think you knew that all along, but you forgot about it that day. “You ran away, and when I stayed put, you constructed a narrative in which by doing the right thing, I was somehow denying everything you’d gone through even though my decision had nothing to do with you. Everything that day was about your trauma, your way of coping, your version of what our next move should be. You equated what was best for Us with what was best for you . You decided that your choice was automatically the correct one, that it was the only one to make, and any subsequent choice that I made had to be some kind of naive mistake simply because it wasn’t the same as yours. And I,” Aziraphale declared with an air of finality, “ decidedly , do not find that particularly fair.”
The thing was, Crowley hated cliches. Honestly hated them. Yet as much as he despised clichés and the stupid, dramatic way they sounded, he really couldn’t describe how he was feeling right this very second other than like he’d just been hit by a bus. He had to hand it to the humans; they hit it right on the head with that one. The breath was legitimately knocked out of him as flashes of past arguments with Aziraphale whipped around in his head so fast he got dizzy.
Some memories were playful teases, others tense debates, but all of them had the same underlying theme: Crowley, implying that Aziraphale was naive, childish, or lesser than because he was a perfect little angel whereas Crowley understood what it was like to Fall, and that made him more traumatized, more capable, more… deserving of whatever it was that let a person call the shots in their own bloody life. He remembered moment after moment in which he got angry— called the angel all sorts of names like Aziraphale was supposed to just accept it because demons get mad sometimes— and then fancied himself into a victim if Aziraphale dared to make his own choice. As if there was some secret about Heavenly abuse that Crowley knew but Aziraphale didn’t, that Aziraphale hadn’t been a victim of, for even longer than Crowley had.
As if Aziraphale didn’t have just as much of a reason to want to change Heaven as Crowley would to abandon it.
How could someone as clever as you be so stupid?
You think you’re a demon? With your neat white, and your curly little—
You’re better than that, angel.
I understand a lot better than you think I do.
You idiot.
Crowley could have wept. He wanted to expel everything, to beg for forgiveness he knew would be granted before he even began because that was just like Aziraphale, wasn’t it? It was what he did, forgiving others— forgiving Crowley — and never expecting the demon to offer the same comfort because Crowley never actually did. In fact, he couldn’t recall a single time in which the words ‘I forgive you’ had ever left his mouth. But surely Aziraphale realized that Crowley forgave him every time they fought, right? The angel had to know that Crowley didn’t harbor some millenia-old resentment that he expected Aziraphale to be guiltily repaying throughout their relationship, in debt for a crime he never committed. Aziraphale knew that he didn’t owe Crowley his entire life.
Didn’t he?
It was moments like these in which Crowley forgot that as much as he felt connected to Aziraphale on every single level, the angel wasn’t actually capable of reading his thoughts. Right now it would seem that he had missed the mark entirely, mistaking Crowley’s objectively horrifying epiphany for disdain— for dismissal. His shoulders sank in disappointment, and Crowley wanted to be sick as he realized that Aziraphale looked resigned but not entirely unsurprised by Crowley’s supposed rejection of every brilliant thing he’d just said.
“You think I'm weak,” Aziraphale said. The worst part was that he barely sounded angry. It was a statement, not an accusation.
Crowley shook his head wildly, desperately. “I don't,” he implored.
Aziraphale made to turn away. “Yes,” he said with an uncharacteristic touch of bitterness, “you do.” Standing up, Aziraphale patted his waistcoat and forced his shoulders upright in a display of stability that Crowley could physically see the cracks in.
The angel continued, “Let’s just leave for the day. I have some things in Heaven that I can take care of— work with other angels whom I’ve gotten on our side. Maybe—” he faltered, “Maybe we shouldn’t do this anymore. Nothing is getting accomplished, and I don’t believe it will unless we solve… whatever this is, and the inhabitants of Earth who will die if the Second Coming commences simply do not have the privilege of time for us to do that.”
The empathy of that last comment, the pure goodness of it despite everything, combined with the twisted, guilty realization that Crowley had derailed so much of their progress by being petty, not to mention that Aziraphale had given him a chance on a silver platter to help end systemic injustice months ago and he’d been too afraid to take it— Someone, he hadn’t even thought about that until now— drove the demon to grab Aziraphale’s arm before he thought through exactly what he was going to say. All he knew was that there was no way in Hell, Heaven, or Earth that he was going to let Aziraphale pop back Upstairs before Crowley could explain, not unless the angel actually wanted to leave. Besides, in this moment— or any moment, really— he was certain that he’d follow Aziraphale anywhere. Even to Heaven. Or a library.
“ Angel ,” Crowley said, more of a prayer than a word. “Please. Stay.”
Aziraphale said nothing, but he didn’t pull away.
Hope rose dangerously in Crowley’s chest. “I’ve been wrong about…well, everything, really,” he said honestly. “But you’re wrong about this. I do not think that you’re weak. I could never think that. I could never think it because you are not weak.”
Aziraphale's shoulders tensed like he didn’t trust him, and even as Crowley felt his heart break, he couldn’t exactly blame him.
“Then why do you act like it?” Aziraphale asked, and again, not angrily. Just… sad. Which in Crowley’s opinion was infinitely worse, because he could handle an angry Aziraphale, but sad?-- the angel was never supposed to be sad, and he definitely wasn’t supposed to be sad because of Crowley.
The demon nearly fell apart as he admitted, “It’s… you’re all I have, Aziraphale.” He gestured helplessly. “And— and that’s not because you’re the only one who’ll tolerate me, even though that’s true enough. It’s more than that. Way more. You’re all I have because you’re— ngk— you’re all I actually, y’know, want . Ever.
“And so when I think something bad is going to happen to you— something like you going back to Heaven even though I know what they did to you— I just…” he swallowed. “I lose it, okay? I lose it. I get that. And sometimes that makes me behave like a right prick towards you if I think that it might save you, even if you can save yourself, and you can, I know you can. I know you’re stronger than Heaven, Hell, and Earth combined— me included— and I'm sorry. I'm so sorry I act like that. You are not my sidekick, or my—” he felt himself turn red— “my love interest, you’re just…everything. You’re everything.”
Aziraphale’s features were, albeit slowly, softening. His jaw unclenched, his eyes blazed with less intensity, and even though Crowley was still yet to relinquish his arm, the tension was noticeably draining from the angel’s body. For the first time, Crowley realized how close together they were standing, Crowley's hand gently cupping the angel’s elbow so that he could easily step away if he wanted to, but Aziraphale hadn’t pulled away. Not yet.
I can fix this, Crowley thought desperately. Please, angel, I can fix this if you let me.
“I can't promise that I won't try to rescue you in the future,” Crowley admitted. Aziraphale opened his mouth to argue, but Crowley quickly cut him off. “I know you, angel. I know you’d gladly sacrifice yourself if it meant someone— anyone—else would go free, only I can't have that because you are not allowed to die on me. I can't promise not to rescue you anymore, I just can’t. M’sorry about that. But,” he said quickly, “But. I can promise to keep in mind how strong you are, and how capable, and how much stronger and more capable you are because you’re also soft and kind— and because you took this job. You…” his shoulders sank, and he forced the stress out of his voice, his posture, his body— making absolutely certain that Aziraphale knew that he was saying none of this out of obligation, that it was the most natural thing in the world to him.
“Of course you should be allowed to make decisions, and of course Heaven was every bit as awful to you as they were to me– moreso, even– and of course changing the system is the right thing to do.” Crowley’s voice was firm and soft at the same time as he said, “Taking this job, going back there and fixing it all by yourself after everything they did to you, it’s— fuck, angel, it’s the bravest thing I’ve ever seen. The most unquestionably good thing I’ve ever seen to the point that it’s honestly a little sickening, but it’s— you know— the good kind of sickening.”
The corner of Aziraphale’s mouth quipped ever so slightly, and it was more than enough to keep Crowley going. He squeezed the angel’s shoulder gently as he concluded, “You, angel, without a fucking doubt, can do this. And I never should have implied I thought you couldn’t, or that it was wrong to try. As much as I wanted to glorify the importance of choosing myself an’ all that, I should’ve realized that when something as hateful as Heaven exists, we have a stupid responsibility to do something about it. You weren’t— fuck, you weren’t betraying me by doing the right thing. You did it all right, angel. All of it. Everything you said, about me, about men and women and me acting just like them, it was… Someone, you’re right about all of it. I'm sorry , Aziraphale. I'm so sorry.”
A single tear ran down Aziraphale’s cheek, and without thinking, Crowley wiped it away. Pink rose to the angel’s face, and Crowley hadn’t thought it was remotely possible for him to fall further, but he had been wrong.
“It’s—- it’s alright,” Aziraphale said without breaking eye contact. There was that forgiveness, the kind that Crowley couldn’t quite believe he was being offered so freely, but with his angel involved he wasn’t exactly surprised, either.
“I'm sorry, too,” Aziraphale continued. “I meant what I said earlier; I shouldn't have said those things about demons, or tried to convince you to leave when you obviously didn’t want to. I should have realized sooner that we were on different paths, but that didn’t make one of our choices better than the other.”
Crowley squeezed his angel’s shoulder. “I forgive you, it’s okay,” he said emphatically, and he meant it. “I should have realized the same thing.”
He physically felt Aziraphale slump in relief the moment the word ‘forgive’ left his mouth, like he’d never been verbally forgiven before, and Crowley felt tears spring to his eyes. He would get better at that, he vowed. Never again would Aziraphale think he had to offer every person in the world a sense of easy forgiveness that he didn’t receive himself.
There was a pause, and Crowley smiled weakly. “I'd… very much like to be friends again, if you’re up for that sort of thing.” Quickly, he added, “And if not, if— if you’re not ready, that’s okay, too. You have the right to make that choice, or any choice, really, that’s… that’s sort of what I'm getting at. You. Choices. You making them. Or not making them! That’s your— er— ‘choice’ .” He forced himself to slow down. This was important, more important than anything he’d ever done or ever would do again. He had to get this one right, he had to, he would .
“You have your autonomy, angel,” he said, steady as anything. “I'll never try to take it away again.”
Aziraphale sniffed and rolled his eyes, but there was nothing but fondness in his gaze, and the bastard actually looked like he was trying not to laugh. “Of course I want to be friends again, you…you…” he slumped against Crowley, forehead resting against the demon’s shoulder.
“Idiot?” Crowley suggested, gently nudging him.
He felt more than he saw Aziraphale’s smile. “Something like that.”
For once Crowley was unashamed of the downright dopey grin on his face as he pulled his angel into a hug, one arm wrapped around his torso and the other buried in cloudlike curls so soft it was almost too difficult to handle without weeping. Aziraphale gripped Crowley back just as tightly, winding his arms around the demon’s back. They stood there for a long, blissful minute, and Crowley would be damned (again) if it wasn’t the best minute of his stupid life.
Suddenly, Aziraphale tensed. “Crowley?” he asked, voice muffled by Crowley’s shoulder. He pulled back just enough to look Crowley in the eye. He looked nervous.
“Yeah?” Crowley said softly. He knew the look Aziraphale was giving him, knew the characteristic softness in his face and openness combined with apprehension in his eyes. Crowley promptly forgot how to breathe, and the only thought he proved capable of forming was: Please.
Aziraphale took a deep breath. “I love you,” he said finally, and there was something so simple, so beautifully blunt, so Aziraphale in the way he said it. “That is, I am in love with you, and I have been for a very long time, more than anything, and I–”
He was promptly interrupted by Crowley’s own sobbing.
“You— are you alright?” Aziraphale asked alarmedly, and Crowley couldn’t help it. He laughed, and cupped his angel’s face to get rid of any of the stupid doubt he saw growing on his infuriatingly perfect face. That doubt could go fuck itself, in Crowley’s not-so-humble opinion.
“Of course I’m alright, you daft, lovely thing.” Crowley actually groaned, for fuck’s sake. “Someone, angel, you have no idea how long I’ve wanted to hear you say that, wanted to tell you that I love you, I love you so much, I’ve been loving you since the Beginning. Since bloody always.”
Aziraphale looked shocked, and it would have been funny if Crowley wasn’t bursting with enough happiness that he didn’t have room for anything else.
“Since the— you what? ” Aziraphale exclaimed, and it dawned on Crowley that as cautiously optimistic as he had been about Aziraphale’s maybe-hopefully-Jesus-Christ-Please requited feelings for him, his angel hadn’t felt the same security. He’d thought his honesty, his love , would be met with rejection. And as absolutely ridiculous and laughable as that was, as incredulous as it made Crowley feel because really, how on Earth could Aziraphale not know — he also knew that Aziraphale didn’t need a disbelieving joke right now. What he needed was to be sure that Crowley meant what he was saying, and fuck if Crowley couldn’t give him that a million times over.
“I love everything about you,” he said honestly. “S’just about the luckiest thing in the world to get to love the person who is going to save it.” His voice softened. “I’ll spend every day for the rest of eternity telling you that you’re not weak— you’re fucking sensational. I love you, angel. I always have, and always will. More than anything,” he emphasized, recalling Aziraphale‘s earlier words that he knew he’d be repeating to himself in perfect memory for the rest of time.
Aziraphale, whose face was warm under Crowley’s hands, physically deflated with relief, or maybe exhaustion. “Oh,” he said.
“Yeah,” Crowley grinned. “Oh.” And then he had another thought, and his breath caught. “Angel, can I…” he trailed off, not sure this was a good idea, and he couldn’t— wouldn’t— mess this up. Not this time.
Aziraphale smiled, breaking Crowley from his thoughts and causing the demon’s brain to short-circuit, and rested a hand on Crowley’s shoulder. “You can tell me anything. I promise. I love you.”
Crowley smiled back at him. “I love you, too.” Someone, he felt giddy just saying it. It was all he wanted to say from now on. “Alright,” he said determinedly. “Can I kiss you?” He swallowed. “It’s just– I didn’t exactly ask your permission the first time around, and that was wrong , like really, really wrong. I love you and I want you and I’d like to kiss you, but I promise, I won’t if you’re not–”
He was cut off by Aziraphale’s lips pressed to his own, and Crowley wasted no time as he buried his hands in his angel’s hair and kissed him back with everything he had. It could have been days, for all he knew, before one of them— he wasn’t sure who— pulled away, and Crowley rested his forehead against Aziraphale’s and simply breathed him in. Somehow Aziraphale’s hands had landed on the lapels of Crowley’s coat, and Crowley’s own hands were hugging Aziraphale’s waist. He made no effort to move.
“That was nice,” Aziraphale said quietly, and Crowley laughed.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “Nice is one word for it.” Perfect was another, as was “the second best thing to happen to Crowley ever in the history of the world , right behind deciding to risk it and have a chat with the enemy in Eden”.
Crowley smiled peacefully at the memory. “C’mon, love,” he murmured in Aziraphale’s ear, pressed cheek to cheek, pleased by his angel’s blush and adorably flustered averting of his eye that followed the nickname. He neatly filed that away for later. “Let me help you save the world.”
“ We,” Aziraphale corrected gently. “ We are going to save the world. And we’ll do it together. Like always.”Crowley hummed in agreement. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Always.”