@legiion
@wemultitudinous
The sound of his name is enough to rouse him from his intent gaze on the dog-eared book in his hands, illuminated only by bright moonlight and the glow of his phone screen held close over the pages. He casts a look at Dean, questioning, and then over to where Castiel is half-crouched over something pale against the dark-carpeted mess of leaves on the forest floor. As if to say to his brother I’m kind of busy, can the angel be your problem, right now?
He clears his throat, hoarse against the cold-damp air of the night.
“Yeah? How much wood could it chuck?” he asks absently, because it feels sorta rude not to respond at all. He turns a page, fumbling between book and phone, and turns it sideways to peer at an illustration in the half-darkness.
all Dean does, all he can do, right now, is suck his bottom lip into his teeth while blinking. slowly. because for one: there’s Cas. almighty Angel of the Lord, on the ground with something about a goddamn woodchuck, that said Angel has said woodchuck. but let’s not forget Sam for two; straight faced and too busy, apparently, with his jolly green giant nose in a book and whatever how much wood could it chuck was — really, Sam? Dean feels his mouth turn bleak, lips stretching before he puckers them at no one. at everyone. he puts his hands, his fists, on his hips, smacking his teeth with his tongue and stares into the blank space through the trees, the endless brush and darkness, the glow of the moon just over the forest.
“ good. ” he says, nodding. yep. “ oh, that’s real good. ”
Experience with the brothers tells Castiel, there a joke in the exchange hidden within the obvious — Sam likely knows woodchucks dig away thirty five cubic feet of dirt per burrow, and that per pound this would equate to 700 pounds of wood if a woodchuck require the conversion. Mostly, he just enjoys being a part of it ( family ).
“ Yes ”, he agrees, amusement briefly curving his mouth. As he straightens, he flexes his stiff wings, and the groundhog bolts. Likely, back home. The angel regards each brother thoughtfully, then the book in Sam’s hands. He turns his back on them again to scrutinize each and every tree he can see.
“ I hope your ability to navigate the text is as good as your employment of a classic American tongue twister, Sam ”, he sighs in earnest, “ I have yet to sense anything of import.”
