Title: Day 3
Author: tarotgal
Fandom: Supernatural
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: Sam/Dean
Disclaimer: Not my characters. I wish they were mine. I definitely don’t get paid for this.
Summary: Sam is allergic to an entire town, and Dean is sympathetic but excited.
Notes: Written during my 12 Ficlets in 12 Days in 2020-21 project project for Anonymous

There was no doubt about it: Sam Winchester was allergic to Middleberg.

“You can’t be allergic to an entire town,” Sam whispered as they walked slowly down an alleyway, sweeping the beams of their flashlights from side to side. It was only early afternoon and a relatively bright day out, but the buildings were tall enough and angled in such a way that the alley remained in shadow. They needed the flashlights to look for clues and possibly the thing they were hunting, though they hadn’t entirely figured out what it was yet. With his free hand, Sam rubbed a couple fingers back and forth beneath his nose, as he’d been doing all day. That was usually all it took to keep him from sneezing when his nose felt a little tickly. And that was usually all it took to drive Dean crazy. But now wasn’t the time for hasty, sneeze-filled sex in the back of the impala.

“True,” Dean whispered back. “I can’t be allergic to an entire town, because I’m only allergic to cats. You, on the other hand…” He trailed off, looking over at Sam continually rubbing his nose. Damn, it was hot to know he had to sneeze, even if right now he was working to hold it back. “You’re allergic to an entire town.”

Dean knew he wasn't, obviously. Sam was probably allergic to the smell of horses that was pervasive throughout the town. Hershey, Pennsylvania, smelled like chocolate everywhere you went. And Citrus Grove, Florida, smelled strongly of oranges. Middleberg, it seemed, smelled of horses. It was like walking around inside a barn, even when you were outside. There was hay and alfalfa and droppings all wrapped into one horse-filled package of which Sam's allergies were clearly not fond.

His breath hitched, peaking Dean's interest. For a moment it seemed like the town had won this fight after all. But Sam pinched his nose tight and held his breath until he let it out in a sigh of relief.

It wouldn't be the worst thing if he sneezed right now. Sure, whatever they were tracking would probably hear them and bolt. But there was no one else to see them right now. No one to see Sam's nostrils go so round. No one to see Sam's body snap forward. No one to see Dean pin Sam against the wall of the alley and grind urgently against him. The bigger problem was that once the floodgates were open and one sneeze was out, his nose would inevitably insist on more. Many more. They didn't have time for that.

There had been deaths. The local cops were clueless, out of their depths. They'd chalked it up to drunk college kids from a nearby town, the investigation hitting one dead end after another. But the Winchesters had recognized them as supernatural, even if they didn’t know what it was exactly. Their dad had documented something like it in his journal, but he hadn't given it a name. He'd just called it the half-man monster with claws. That sounded bad enough, honestly. It probably didn’t even need a name.

“What was that?” Sam swung his flashlight back to where it had just been, and Dean added his as well. Like an animal at night, the eyeshine of the creature caught in the beams was hard to miss. But it was tough to get a good look at it apart from the glowing yellow eyes. Its silhouette was bulky and hunched. Then eyelids came down, and suddenly it was gone.

Dean and Sam both rushed forward to the spot where it had been, but nothing was there apart from a couple bags of trash that had been slashed open.

“Maybe it was just a raccoon?”

Dean gave his brother a withering look.

Sam rubbed harder at his nose. “All right. Hey, at least I didn’t sneeze and spook it into attacking us.”

The kid had a point. Sam continued to rub and pinch his nose to keep the tickles in check as they finished searching the alley. There was no further sign of the whatever-it-was or any indication of where it might have gone. Or how it had gone. That was the part that worried Dean more than anything else. He wasn’t easily rattled, but a monster who could be there one moment and vanish the next wasn’t going to be easy to gank.

Looking over at Sam, Dean sighed. “I think it’s unavoidable, Sammy.”

Sam groaned. “Not the library!”

Dean gave his brother a pat on the back. “We’ll try to make it quick.”

*

Normally, Sam was the one most interested in taking a trip to the library, and Dean was the one complaining. Normally, Sam easily immersed himself in researching local legends, finding hints of strange occurrences in newspaper articles, and reading through obituaries. Normally, Sam wasn’t trying to fight off ticklish, allergic sneezes.

“I hate this,” Sam whispered right into Dean’s ear as saying it any other way would have been overheard by the dozens of patrons and library staff. The library was unusually small, even for a small town library. And apart from someone turning a page or sliding a book off the shelf, it was eerie how quiet it was inside. In fact, Dean wouldn’t have been surprised if everybody in the library had listened to them interviewing the library director for the past ten minutes. It was the first time in a long while they weren’t in a library for research, but that was where you had to go when the associate director of the library went missing.

“He disappeared in the middle of his shift. Someone had to have seen something.” Dean patted Sam’s arm. “Don’t worry. Only eleven more interviews to go.”

Sam’s eyes widened and he pinched his nose tighter between thumb and forefinger, pursing his lips, holding his breath. This shouldn’t have been so hot. Dean loved when Sam sneezed. He loved the breathy build-ups and the strong releases and the complete helplessness that came with each and every sneeze. This was the exact opposite. This was Sam holding back a sneeze, staying in control. By every bit of logic, Dean should hate this. But he didn’t. In fact, all this only seemed to increase the anticipation. It was like every second of struggling now was full of some extended foreplay that would pay off later.

And no matter what happened with the case, Dean was going to insist it pay off. “How about you let it out now?” he whispered, his lips tickling Sam’s ear they were so close.

Sam looked around nervously. Sneezing one of his loud sneezes in the middle of a library seemed like a terrible idea, but he could direct it into the crook of his arm to muffle the sound, and Dean could rub his back, and then it wouldn’t be so bad.

“Maybe if you just let one out your nose won’t be so itchy, and you’ll be able to get through the rest of the interviews?”

Skeptical but trusting, Sam loosened his grip on his nose. Dean watched his nostrils flare widely, taking in a sharp, urgent breath.

“I was told you needed to talk to me about Benjamin?”

As Dean quickly changed modes from lusting to interviewing, Sam jammed the back of his wrist beneath his nose, pressing as hard as he could. After a few moments, he forced his eyes to open again and let out a smooth, controlled breath. “When was the last time you saw your coworker?”

*

“This is crazy, Sammy. You’ve got to sneeze.”

“I hih! I know I’ve gotta! Hihh!”

Dean glanced around, making sure no one was anywhere near the car. The sidewalks seemed abandoned this late in the evening. Not so much as a mail carrier or a dog walker out in this neighborhood. He set his hand on Sam’s thigh and rubbed it up and down. “Okay, then just let it out. There’s no one here but us.” Well, there was Baby, but the car had seen far worse than what was about to happen.

“Not ihhhhhh! Not sure hih I should.”

Dean licked his lips. Watching Sam like this, knowing there was an incredibly ticklish sneeze right there, waiting to be let out, made Dean hotter than that time they fought a lava spirit in Washington state. “C’mon. Let it out for me.”

Sam’s eyes flashed with desire, but then he shook his head. “hih! I hih! I c-c—“

Dean loved when he tried to talk through a sneeze, but this time he never found out what Sam was trying to say between his involuntary gasps. Because something came out of absolutely nowhere and landed on the hood of the car.

“Hey!” Sawed-off in one hand, vengeance in his eyes, Dean threw open the driver’s side door and charged at the monster. It took off at a fast clip on all fours, but he ran after it, gun raised. He could hear Sam’s quick footfalls and heavy breathing behind him as he ran down the center of the residential street. It would have made for quite the sight if anyone should be looking out their windows at this time of night. Dean doubted anyone would call this into emergency services and risk sounding like a lunatic, even if someone was watching. But, either way, finally catching this thing was worth a possible report.

*

“ihh! HIH! HIH!” Dean pinched Sam’s nose for him. He wanted so badly to scream ‘Not now!’ but Sam didn’t need to be told this was the worst possible time to sneeze. Any second now, the monster was going to come barreling through the open barn door looking for them. And as long as it made it four feet inside without getting spooked, it was going to stumble on the modified devil’s trap.

Dad’s journal had said it worked for him, and Dean had no reason to doubt their father or his hunting abilities. But he’d never heard of a creature being trapped by something like this, and he was only mostly sure he’d drawn it correctly. Sam had been no use at all in making it, which was probably for the best. One slip of his hand from an involuntary breath and they’d have to start over. Sam hadn’t been much of a help in clearing the hay aside or covering the barn floor with it again either. His allergies had been bad all day, but here in the barn they were impossibly worse. He’d been so close to sneezing for so long, Dean knew it was only a matter of time before one escaped.

But that moment couldn’t be now. Not when they were hiding behind bales of hay, trying to be silent. Not when they were only a few yards from the creature. One sneeze would ruin everything.

“HIH!”

Dean clapped his other hand over Sam’s mouth. His brother’s puppy dog eyes stared back at him, apologetic, helpless. Damn, that did all sorts of things to Dean. He wanted to pull Sam to him and let him sneeze this horribly annoying tickle out. He wanted to reassure him that he wasn’t cross. He wanted to tell Sam that this was possibly the most turned on he’d been all day. Adrenaline running on high from the impending catch, feeling Sam’s nose trying to twitch against his fingers and Sam’s breath hot against his palm, Dean nearly lost control of himself.

But then came a roar of frustration. Dean launched himself over the hay to see the, well, the half-man monster with claws, scratching at the floor. Its nose-snout pushed against an invisible barrier, trying to escape. In one moment, Dean both marveled at the fact that the trap had actually worked and fired a silver bullet dipped in holy water into the creature.

It let out another roar, this one in anguish. Dean unloaded a second shot, and it slumped over. It lay motionless on the floor of the barn, but Dean stared at it still, wanting to make absolutely sure it was finished before letting down his guard.

It was definitely dead. Dean nudged its limp, dark gray body with the toe of his boot, and it didn’t budge. Its chest did not rise and fall. Its silvery blood spilled out onto the symbol, rendering the magic useless. If it had still been alive, it would surely have escaped the trap, blinked away or limped away or come crashing through the hay to claw them to shreds. But it did not move.

“It’s dead,” Sam said, coming up beside him and stating the obvious.

Dean laid a hand on Sam’s shoulder and took a deep breath. He let it out with a sigh along with the words, “I’ll get the shovels.”

*

Sam hadn’t sneezed once while they dug the pit and burned the half-man monster with claws. He hadn’t sneezed as they painted over the symbol on the barn floor. He hadn’t even sneezed as they drove back to their motel room. Or when they’d gotten inside the motel room. Or when Dean had pushed him down on the bed for a prolonged kiss.

“Ihhhh-it’s stuck,” Sam explained. He nuzzled his nose against Dean’s shirt, which smelled like the barn. Hell, both of them smelled like the barn. The whole town smelled like the barn. And that should have been enough to set Sam’s nose off finally. But it wasn’t.

Sam pinched his nose at the bridge, squinting his eyes closed tight. Dean kissed Sam’s forehead. “I’m going to get you some Tylenol for that pain,” he said. He could read Sam’s body language well enough to know when sinus pressure was being a bitch. And as much as he loved when Sam sneezed, he hated seeing Sam miserable. So he got two Tylenol from the first aid kit and a glass of water from the bathroom then sat down on the edge of one of the queen-sized beds beside Sam. “Here.” He tried to sound caring and reassuring rather than disappointed.

Sam downed the pills and went straight back to nuzzling. It was Dean's turn to wince. “Sam, you'd better not do that. If you don't feel up to—”

Raising his head, Sam narrowed his eyes at Dean. “Why w-wouldn't I feel up to it?”

Dean stroked the bridge of Sam's nose as a reminder, his finger sliding over the faint red line made from pushing his nose up when rubbing it all day. “You're in pain.”

“Just a little dis-ihhh-discomfort. I still n-need to sneeze.” Sam laid a hand on Dean's chest, splaying his fingers and then gathering a fistful of Dean's flannel shirt. He pulled Dean closer. His voice was breathy, hitching with the light urge to sneeze. “And sneezing will hehhh make me feel so much better. But I need you to help me.”

A hundred ideas flashed through Dean's mind, things he'd imagined for years. Straddling Sam and tickling his nose with a feather. Lying beneath Sam and twirling the rolled-up pointed corner of a tissue into one of his nostrils. Holding fine, white pepper in his palm and letting Sam snuffle into it while he stroked himself with his other hand. Except he didn't have any pepper. And there was a feather in the Impala, but it was one of the things they'd taken off a witch a few months ago, and Dean didn't want to bring anything witchy into their bed. Tissues would be easier to get a hold of.

“Dean?”

Licking his lips, Dean smiled back at Sam. “How do you want me to help?”

Even though Sam's face was twitching a little with the need to sneeze, the corners of his mouth turned up at this. “Just... t-touch my nose lightly.”

That was all? With all the rubbing and pinching and scrubbing Sam had done all day to keep the sneeze, back seemed impossible that simply touching it could make the sneeze come out. That seemed like a kind of magic, but one Dean couldn't resist this time. Dean crooked a pointer finger and drew his fingertip against the bottoms of Sam's quivering nostrils.

Immediately, Sam's breath hitched.

Dean's eyes widened. “I hadn't actually expected that to work.”

“Deeeean...” Sam whined. “I've g-g-guhh-gotta sneeze.”

Dean's pulse raced as he touched Sam's nose again. “Okay,” he whispered. “Then sneeze.”

“hih! Dean-ehhh!”

“We're alone now, and I want you to sneeze for me.” He tickled Sam's nose some more, watching it wiggle more violently in response. “You were so amazing holding it in all day. But you don't have to hold back any more.”

Sam's nostrils flared, and his eyelids fluttered closed. “ehh! HEH!”

“I've got you, Sammy.” He slid his other hand around behind Sam's back.

Sam's eyebrows knit together, his mouth dropped open, and his head tilted back with one more, giant, sharp breath. “Hehh-HIHHHSHOO!”

Over the years, Sam had sneezed thousands of times, and Dean had heard most of them. But he had never heard Sam sneeze quite like this before. The sneeze was huge and shook them both as they sat on the bed. Dean as good as felt it through his own body.

“Bl—” Dean didn't even get a chance to say 'bless you.'

“HAHH... HAHHShuhhh! HEHHTTTSHOO!” Sam snapped forward violently into Dean, who wrapped both his arms around Sam and laid them both down on their sides against the loud-patterned motel bedspread. It seemed safer to have Sam lie down where Dean could hold him steady when the sneezes were so extremely strong.

But then he felt Sam's leg move between his. And Sam's thigh press into his crotch. And Sam's wet nose slide against his cheek. And then it was Dean's breath that became shallow and irregular. He didn't even have his jeans off yet, and he was already so close to losing it. “I don't think... I'm going to make it much longer,” Dean said. “Your teasing and build-ups all day today... oh, fuck, Sam, I'm so hard.”

The pleased expression on Sam's face was unmissable, and he locked his gaze with Dean's even as he trailed his hands down Dean's flannel-clad chest. One hand fiddled with Dean's belt buckle, button, and zipper then plunged into Dean's pants. The skin-on-skin contact made Dean groan with pleasure. Sam's other hand found Dean's. “Touch my nose again.”

“Sam!”

“Just hahh just do it. You take care of me, and hehhh! and I take care of you.”

Dean's fingertip brushed lightly along the side of Sam's nose, amazed by the almost magical way Sam's nostrils flared immediately in reaction. His nose was just so sensitive, so sneezy, so in need of release. He could relate all too well. “Sneeze for me,” Dean whispered.

Sam did. “HAHSHOO! HATTSCHOOO! HAHKSHOO!” And Sam stroked. The way his body jerked when he sneezed helped rather than hindered his movements as he worked another kind of magic on Dean's cock. It made his touch irregular and unpredictable. And Dean's hypersensitive, leaking cock was more than receptive to it. Dean thrust his hips forward and back instinctively, causing the cheap mattress beneath them to squeak.

Sam started to slide down, and Dean shook his head, grabbing the collar of Sam's shirt. “No,” Dean gasped. “Stay here. I want to watch you when you sneeze.”

A soft kiss pressed to Dean's lips was as much of a reassurance as Sam's reply, “Don't worry, you'll still be able to see me. I'll make sure of it.”

This time, when he slid down, Dean let him. It took a little bit of shifting and weight distributing until Sam could tug Dean's pants and boxers down to his ankles. Then he grinned up at Dean for a second before running his nose along the length of Dean's hard cock. Sam's nose twitched immediately with the need to sneeze.

Dean moaned and Sam sneezed. But Sam pulled back far enough for Dean to get a good look at him. “HAKKTIHSHOOO! IHHHSHoo! HEHHTSchoo! HEHHHKschoo! Sniff!”

Feeling the light spray against his crotch and bare abdomen, Dean simply couldn't hang on any longer. He came powerfully, moaning, but keeping his eyes open the whole time so he could see every twitch of Sam's handsome face when he sneezed and every wrinkle in Sam's nose when he sniffled. When Dean finished, he lay still, letting his breathing slow, not wanting to break the magic by speaking words.

Sam had no problem doing so. “Wow. That was fast.”

“Oh fuck you.”

Sam smiled. “Is that a promise? Sniff! Sniff! I mean, after that, do you think you still could?”

“Do you still feel like you need to sneeze?”

“Oh yeah. I feel so sneezy. Don't think I'll be stopping any time soon.” He rubbed his nose the way he'd been doing all day, and Dean marveled at how his own touch didn't make his nose tickle the way Dean's did.

Tingles and excitement raced through Dean. “Then absolutely. Round two starts now.”

Sam's smile faltered then his mouth dropped open. “Hahhh... HAH... HAHIPTSHHHHH! HAKKSHOO!”

*

“I love Middleberg.”

Sam finished blowing his nose for the fifth time and gave him a weak smile. “I bet you do. Sniff! Sniff! It's a good thing we don't repeat towns for jobs. I'm going to... to...”

“To sneeze?” Dean grinned, savoring the sneezy look on Sam's slack face.

The sneeze threw him forward again, still powerful, though closer to Sam's normal. “hehhh-HEHH-Shooo!”

Sam pulled a tissue out of the box and blew his nose for a sixth time. “I was about to say that I'm going to be thrilled when we leave Middleberg. I've sniff! My nose has never tickled so much.” He moved closer, nuzzling his face against the side of Dean's chin, as if the day-old stubble could somehow soothe the tickle in his nose. It couldn't. “hehhh-HIHHShhhhh!”

Dean moaned softly at the feel of the strong spray. He stroked the back of Sam's head. It was going to take a little while to work up the energy for another round, but he was already looking forward to it. Sam was right; they didn't take jobs in repeat towns for good reason. But that didn't mean they couldn't take a short detour to a town for a few hours of R&R. Given how allergic Sam was to Middleberg, a couple hours was all they'd need. Assuming Sam was up for it.

He felt Sam's hand slide down, unbutton and unzip his jeans. And he felt Sam take another sharp, urgent breath.