"Tell Me You Didn't..."

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"How did this even happen?" Emma asked as she rubbed some sort of infection-preventing ointment into Baelfire's hand. Somehow he had managed to cut his palm on goodness knows what; her poor clumsy young husband, bless his little soul, was always getting himself into all kinds of mishaps.

"It uh," he grinned nervously before he continued. "It just sort of, happened--"

"Yes obviously, but how?" she interrupted. Her patience was running thin these days, a combination caused by their child growing inside her womb - those darn hormones - and with her husband all of sudden - or, at least since their recent marriage three months ago - wanting to become a Mist Haven soldier - something poor Emma really didn't approve of. Sure it was a very honorable aspiration, and his bravery fit the criteria and, being a good and proper wife she wanted to support him in his dreams and everything but, she wasn't very sure of his actual intentions. When they fell in love he had been a simple sheep boy and she would have been more than happy for him to stay that way but now that they were married...

The night he brought up the possibility at the swan pond - in deliberate defiance to Charming's 'not to be alone without a chaperone' rule - he had said something about how being part of the Mist Haven army would make him 'more worthy of her'. Oh how she wanted to slap him for even thinking that! She tried, with no avail apparently, to make him see and understand that he didn't need to feel that way and that she's a person, just like him only with a fancy royal title before her name which was really only a word. 'I fell in love with the simple sheep boy,' she had told him. 'What makes you think I would think any differently now that we're at the castle?' However, much to Emma's frustration her words fell on deaf ears and she wondered if Balefire really wanted this because he felt he needed to prove his worth to her parents - mainly her father who put no effort in hiding his disdain for him in the very beginning - and if that was the case (and it probably was because Baelfire had a habit of taking even the simplest things to heart)... it saddened her.

After she looked up at him with an annoyed glare she repeated her question and began to wrap up his hand with an old rag; some blood began to seep through and she hoped that his wound didn't actually need to be stitched up.

"I don't--"

Emma rolled her eyes and cut him off once again. "Please do not tell me that you picked up your sword by the sharp end!"

Baelfire was quiet as he put his healthy hand behind his neck and grinned nervously - a dead giveaway that he did in fact pick his sword up by the sharp side.

Emma made an expression of disbelief. "Oh mercy, you did, didn't you?!"

Baelfire winced at the tone of her words - or was it from the way she was wrapping his hand? Her sudden mood seemed to be reflecting through her touch. "I'm sorry... I, I guess I wasn't thinking."

"You see?" she finished wrapping his hand and tied off the rag but continued to hold on to his hand. "That is your problem, Bae! You don't think!! Instead you act on, on your emotions and..." she let go of his injured hand and motioned with her own as she tried to think of the correct word or term - again, thank you, baby brain. "On whatever this was!" she felt tears start to flood her eyes and that made her even more mad. "You're rash and you're clumsy and you're not - you're not cut out for this." That was probably mean but it needed to be said - well maybe she could have said it gentler but... yeah, she shouldn't have said that, and now she felt guilty as she saw the look of surprise, and, oh no! Was it mixed with hurt? The last thing she wanted to do was hurt him. She glanced at his bandaged hand and took it in hers again then looked up at him, her expression softer than it had been just a few moments ago. "I'm sorry," she said, her green eyes moist with coming tears. "I didn't mean what I said - well, I kinda did, but I didn't mean for them to come out sounding so harsh."

"Tell Me You Didn't." (Companion one shot to 'Secrets, Lies, and Blessings')Where stories live. Discover now