“What did you expect me to say?”

starsinursa:

Dean’s bored.

They’ve been parked for
an hour on the curb, waiting for the grocery store clerk who
may-or-may-not-be-a-werewolf to come home, and there hasn’t been a stitch of
movement. 

…well, unless they count the guy’s 90-year old neighbor who came out to
water her garden, hair rollers and all, and winked lasciviously at Sam sitting in the passenger seat. Even if
it did buoy Dean’s mood significantly – it was always a hoot seeing Sammy get
all disgruntled and embarrassed, wrinkling his nose like his sensibilities were offended – it didn’t really have anything to do with the case.

So, yeah. Bored.

He shifts in his seat, kicking out his feet and splaying his legs in the footwell, and glances into the rearview mirror. “Hey,
Cas. Knock knock.”

Castiel looks up, staring at him from the back seat. “…what?”

“Knock knock,” Dean
repeats. He drums the fingers of one hand on his thigh in anticipation.

“…I don’t understand.”

Next to him,
Sam snorts. Dean swats at him to get him to shut up.

“Don’t make me call sweet little Mildred
back here,” he warns Sam, who blanches. “It’s a knock-knock
joke, Cas. I’m pretending to knock on a door, you answer it, and I tell a
joke.”

“I see,” Castiel says. 

Dean
secretly thinks he’s full of shit, because his tone implies that he doesn’t ‘see’
at all.

“All right, fine, let’s
try it again. Knock knock.”

“Please come in, Dean,”
Castiel says politely.

Sam makes a strained noise and bites his lips, obviously fighting to keep the amusement off his face.
Castiel just looks confused, glancing from Dean to Sam and then back to Dean.

“Did I do it wrong?”

“Nah, Cas.” Dean tries to sound reassuring, but it’s hard when he’s trying to keep the smirk off his own face. “…well, I mean, technically yeah, but you
didn’t know.”

“What did I do wrong?” He’s starting to look annoyed and smite-y. “What did you expect me to say?”

“You say, ‘who’s there?’, okay? I say ‘knock knock’, you say ‘who’s there?’”

“But I already know it’s
you.”

“…you’re missing the
point of the joke, Cas.”

“Fine,” Castiel huffs,
definitely looking annoyed now. “Tell me again.”

“Okay. Knock knock.”

“Who’s there?” Castiel asks,
with the most dramatic, exaggerated show of long-suffering patience that Dean’s ever seen. Dean thinks he needs an updated title: Castiel, Angel of the Lord, Drama Queen.

“Harp,” he says instead.

Castiel squints at him in the mirror.

“…I still don’t get it,”
he says finally.

Dean groans and drops
his head back, thumping it softly against the back of the seat. And then doing it again, for good measure. “No, no, you have to repeat what I say.
I say ‘harp’, you say ‘harp who?’”

“This is a lot of work.”

“Last time,” Dean insists,
because he’s committed at this point, damn it. He will finish this friggin’ joke if it
kills him. “Knock knock.”

“Who’s there,” Castiel
mutters.

“Harp.”

“Harp who?”

“Harp…the Herald Angels
sing,” Dean finishes, triumphant.

Sam groans and puts his
face in his hands. Castiel just frowns at him. Definitely not the face of someone who’s cracking up with laughter on the inside.

“Dude, don’t you get it?
It’s a wordplay joke, Cas. Harp sounds like ‘hark –‘”

“He gets it, Dean,” Sam
interrupts. “He just doesn’t think you’re funny.”

Dean scowls. “Screw you guys, I’m hilarious.”

“You’re definitely not.”

“Shut it, Sammy! Cas, you get the joke, right? Tell Sam that I’m funny!”

“…your face is funny?”
Cas says haltingly, and Dean’s mouth falls open in shock – and betrayal, oh, the betrayal. 

Sam bursts out laughing, doubling over and wrapping his arms around his stomach. He almost hits his giant, stupid forehead
on the dashboard, which would have served him right, Dean thinks.

“Oh my god!” he gasps. “You just got
burned by Cas!”

For a guy who’s supposed to be Dean’s friend, Castiel looks
inordinately smug and pleased with himself, straightening up in the backseat. “I did it right?”

“Yeah, yeah, you did it
right,” Dean grumbles. Against his better judgment – God forbid he actually encourage this kind of behavior – his lips twitch in a smile. “Congratulations,
you’re a regular comedian.”

Sam wipes his eyes and twists around in the seat to grin at Castiel. “Good job, Cas. You’re definitely getting funnier. You have my blessing to make fun of Dean
anytime.”

“Hey!”

Castiel looks almost
touched. “Thank you, Sam.”

Rolling his eyes, Dean glances out the windows. The house they’re watching is still stubbornly, infuriatingly, quiet. He sighs.

“Fine, how about this one. An angel and a demon walk into a bar -”