A/N: Admittedly, this story has nothing to do with anything that actually happened with my students. It was inspired by a book title I happened to see when I was browsing some teacher resources. What popped into my head when I saw it made me smile, and I knew I had to write about it. What was the book? Moose's Loose Tooth.

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural. No copyright infringement is intended.

Fill Number: Solemn Husbandry of Exultation, Fill #3; Lessons Learned, Fill #4; By Any Other Name, Fill #4; Terms of Service, Fill #3
Representation(s): Dean Winchester; Winchester Family; Elementary School; Taking Care of Little Brother; Medical Field (School Nurse)
Bonus Challenge(s): Machismo (fear, crying); Oblique; Second Verse (Sitting Hummingbird, Non-Traditional, Mouth of Babes, Nightingale, Unwanted Advice, Misshapen Pods)
Word Count: 1502

Setting: November 1989

Dean is in fourth grade; Sam is in first grade.

T is for Tooth

The fourth grade hallway is empty when Dean steps outside the classroom, so he breaks into a run. He doesn't think anyone will bother coming out to try and stop him, but if they do, he has an excuse this time: he's just gotten a call over the PA system to come down to the nurse's office. There's only a couple of things that could mean: Sammy must be either hurt or sick. He knows it's Sammy's lunch period, so sick is probably the more likely of the two, but his brother's been having a lot of trouble with bullies this year, so he can't rule out either. In any case, he needs to get there as fast as he can.

He remembers—barely—to slow down before he actually reaches the office, but he's still out of breath by the time he gets there. He ignores the secretary's greeting and heads straight for the open door of the nurse's office. He doesn't see Sammy at first; there's no one in any of the chairs or on the little cot by the wall. Then he finally notices Mrs. Wilkins crouched down on the floor near the far corner, and beyond her, he can just see the top of his brother's shaggy head.

"Sammy!" He rushes over to him, ducking around Mrs. Wilkins, who moves back to give him room. His little brother is curled up in a tight ball, his head pressed against his knees and his arms locked around his legs. Dean drops to his knees and begins to rub Sammy's back. "What's wrong, Sammy? Talk to me."

Still not looking up, Sammy shakes his head. Dean looks questioningly at Mrs. Wilkins.

She sighs. "It's just a loose tooth. He bit into a carrot at lunch and almost knocked it out, but it's still hanging on by a thread. He won't open his mouth so I can pull it the rest of the way out."

Dean grins in relief; he was expecting something much worse. Still, he doesn't like the way she said, "It's just a loose tooth." It sounds like she's annoyed with his brother, or like she thinks he's making a big deal out of nothing. "Well, of course he doesn't want to let you pull it. This is his first time losing a tooth; he's just a little freaked out. Give him a break."

He ignores Mrs. Wilkins's offended look as Sammy raises his head a little, encouraged by Dean coming to his defense. His lips are still clamped tightly shut, though. Dean gently puts his hands on the sides of Sammy's head, cradling his face between his hands so his little brother can only see him and not the nurse.

"Hey, buddy. It's okay, I'm not gonna let her hurt you. You know we've gotta get this tooth out, though, right? I told you it was gonna happen, remember, when it first started getting wiggly?"

Sammy nods.

"I mean, you know I've already lost eight of them. See?" He opens his mouth to show Sammy his grown-up teeth, the top front ones with an awkward little gap between them and the bottom ones all crowded together. Dad's mentioned something about having to figure out how he's going to pay for braces, but Dean isn't too thrilled about that prospect.

Sammy nods again, but his mouth is still clamped shut. He looks scared. If he's being honest, Dean is, too; Dad pulled most of his teeth except for the couple that came out during a fight, so this is going to be as much of a new experience for him as for Sammy. No way is he going to let the nurse touch his brother, though, and if the tooth as loose as she says, then it can't wait until Dad gets home tonight.

"You know, you'll get your first visit from the tooth fairy tonight, too. A whole new quarter, just for you. You could buy some candy for the next time we're on the road or something." He hates lying to his little brother about the tooth fairy—that's one mythical creature he knows isn't real, because she's always managed to "forget" about his tooth on nights when Dad's come home drunk—but it won't matter, because if Dad forgets to leave the quarter, he'll make sure and do it. He's been saving one for the purpose ever since Sammy's tooth got loose.

One side of Sammy's mouth tugs up in a half-smile. Dean smiles back. "So, will you open up for me?"

The smile disappears as Sammy pulls back.

"Come on. It barely hurts at all, just for like a second. Then it's all over."

"But it is gonna hurt," Sammy mumbles, trying to open his mouth as little as possible. Still, it's progress.

"Just for a second. I'll do it really fast; you'll barely know it's happening until it's over."

Sammy looks at him uncertainly. "Are you sure?"

"Definitely," says Dean, wishing he felt as sure as he sounds. How exactly does he get a hold on the tooth, anyway? His fingers aren't exactly slender, and Sammy's got a tiny mouth, and besides, the tooth is sure to be slippery. What if he can't pull it out on the first try and he ends up hurting Sammy? Then his brother won't trust him to try it again, and they'll be stuck with no way to get Sammy's tooth out.

He seems to have convinced his brother, though, if not himself, because Sammy hesitantly says, "Okay." He opens his little mouth as wide as he can, and Dean can finally see the tooth. It's pushed over backwards, practically lying down flat.

Before he can do anything, Mrs. Wilkins lays a hand on his shoulder. She directs him to go over to the sink and wash his hands, which Dean quickly does before either he or Sammy can lose their nerve. Then she hands him a piece of gauze and instructs him to use it to grab onto the tooth. Oh, so that's how you do it.

He puts his left hand on Sammy's shoulder to hold him steady and tells Sammy to put his hand on his arm and squeeze if it hurts. Then, with the gauze wrapped around his right hand, he slowly reaches into Sammy's mouth. His brother flinches a little when he touches the tooth, but he's able to move it up to where he can get ahold of it without incident. He takes a deep breath, trying to stay calm. "It's okay, Sammy," he says, more for his own sake than for his brother's. Then he pulls.

There's a hard squeeze on his left arm as his right hand comes free, his knuckles hitting Sammy's top teeth on the way out. The sudden force knocks him backwards onto his bottom. Sammy starts crying, and Dean can see blood coming from a gap in his front bottom teeth. A gap. He got it!

Dean opens up his hand as the nurse gives Sammy a little wad of gauze and instructs him to bite down. There in his hand, bloody and wrapped in gauze, is a perfect little baby tooth, Sammy's first one.

He scoots forward and shows it to Sammy, who's starting to calm down now that the initial shock is over. His brother grins and tries to say something around the gauze in his mouth, but all that comes out is an unintelligible mumble.

"What?"

Sammy pulls the gauze out. The bleeding is slowing down, but it hasn't stopped yet. "I said it didn't hurt a bit!"

"Yeah, right," Dean says, giving his shoulder a playful punch. "You totally freaked out."

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

Mrs. Wilkins tells Sammy to put the gauze back in, and Dean grins at him smugly. The next "Did not!" comes out so muffled it's impossible to understand, so Dean figures he's won the argument.

The nurse brings Sammy a little bag to put his tooth in and tells him to make sure not to lose it. Sammy immediately hands it to Dean, who tucks it carefully away in his pocket. "I'll give it back to you before bed tonight, okay?" he says.

Sammy nods. Mrs. Wilkins checks his gum again to make sure the bleeding has stopped and that there's no pain, and then she sends both of the boys back to class.

As he walks Sammy down the hallway to his classroom, Dean decides he's going to make sure he gets to his brother's room tonight before Dad does. He knows for a fact that Dad threw away those of his teeth he actually took, because he saw one in the bathroom trash can one morning. And that's fine; he doesn't really care whether Dad wants to keep his old teeth or not.

But Dean does want to keep Sammy's first baby tooth, the one he pulled himself on the very first try. For some reason, there's just something special about that.

A Note to Reviewers: Thank you so much for taking the time to read and review! Because I am writing this story specifically for the MC4A challenges, I will not be writing or posting the stories in their final order and will have to rearrange the chapters frequently. Due to FFN's system of tagging reviews to the chapter numbers rather than the chapters themselves, the system may tell you that you have already reviewed a chapter when you haven't. If this is the case, and you would still like to leave a review (I hope you will!), please consider either posting the review on the current last chapter (as even if you've reviewed that chapter before, you won't have reviewed that position) or logging out and posting the review as a guest (with your username filled in so I know who to thank!). I'm so sorry for the inconvenience; I wish the system worked differently. Thank you again for your constructive feedback; it means the world to me!