Growing infection

FieryFlame12 asked for a oneshot of Neal (12) and Emma getting into a big fight and Neal ends up cutting Emma (by accident) with a knife. He begs her not to tell their parents. She ends up in hospital with an infection and they end up finding out anyway. The age gap has been lowered to one year on request.

"I told you that you weren't supposed to be in here you little dweeb!" Emma screamed at her little brother. Her parents had just nipped out to get some bread, leaving Emma and Neal home alone for five or ten minutes. As the big sister, Emma decided that meant she was in charge. Neal had tried to come in to raid the fridge several times already. Apparently, he couldn't wait the five minutes for bread for lunch.

"Would you quit it already!" Neal yelled back. "You're not the boss of me. If I want a snack, I'm getting one. What you gonna do about it?" Neal challenged her. Emma's eyes narrowed. He wasn't big enough to overpower her, something he clearly needed reminding of. Filled with rage, Emma came charging over to her little brother, intending to wet willy him into submission. Neal panicked. He reached behind him to where some things were drip drying from breakfast. He thought he'd got his hand around the spatula to whack her with in self-defence. What he had actually grabbed was one of the really sharp knives. He held it out in front of him, swishing it down. Emma's eyes widened in terror. She leapt backwards just in time to avoid a serious injury, but the tip of the knife caught her index finger and sliced all the way down. She screamed out in agony as blood began to drip down her finger and splash onto the floor.

"You little freak!" Emma screamed.

"I-I'm sorry!" Neal stammered back. "It was an accident, I didn't think I had a knife! I thought it was a spatula!" He explained. He was going to be in so much trouble. "Emma, please don't tell mom and dad." He begged her. "You'll get in trouble too for fighting with me." He pointed out. "Then you won't be able to go the arcade tomorrow." Emma thought about it for a moment. The little twerp was right. She really wanted to see her parents letting him have it for basically stabbing her, but she didn't want to miss out either.

"Fine." She grumbled. "Clean up this mess, you're doing my chores for a week." She told him. She then grabbed some kitchen roll and put pressure on the wound, holding it up. It hurt like Hell, but it stopped bleeding pretty quickly. As the pain ebbed, so did her anger. She had provoked Neal, she knew she shouldn't have been such a bossy boots, but she still didn't think she deserved to be mutilated!

With some careful positioning of her hand (mainly in her pocket), Emma managed to continue to hide the injury from either of her parents. The problem came about a week later when her finger suddenly began to swell overnight. It had been getting more and more sore, but Emma had just hoped that meant it was on the mend. By the morning, she couldn't even bend it properly, and there was pus leaking out the wound. Even still, Emma tried to keep it from them, thinking she could grab some painkillers from the pharmacy. But Sneezy ratted her out. By the time Emma reached the school, her parents were waiting for her.

"Finger." Snow instructed. Emma did her best to look confused. "Don't play stupid, Emma Ruth. Sneezy called us. Let me see this finger." Emma gave them her uninjured hand.

"Other hand." Charming told her. Emma was hesitant. "If I have to count down from three you won't like what happens next." Charming warned her. Emma sighed, showing them the injured hand. Both her parents gasped in horror.

"Emma, this is infected, and obviously has been for some time!" Snow told her. How had neither of them noticed this?! "What happened?"

"I…cut it, a few days ago. I thought it was healing." Emma partially lied. Her parents gave her funny looks. They knew when Emma was lying.

"Ok, looks like we're playing twenty questions then." Charming sighed. He had hoped to avoid this. "Should keep us occupied on the way to the hospital."

"No." Emma complained. "I don't need to go to the hospital. I just need some of these pills…"

"Oh those are water tablets Sneezy gave you so you wouldn't get suspicious." Snow told her, steering Emma towards the car. "You need proper antibiotics given by a doctor. Get in." Emma saw she had no choice, so clambered into the back seat. She went to put on her seatbelt, but found her mother doing it for her.

"My whole hand hasn't been chopped off." Emma complained. Snow sighed.

"Don't test me, Emma. You're skating on thin ice already." She warned her. Emma didn't respond. Her mom got into the front passenger seat and they set off for the hospital.

"Ok, so, let's get to the bottom of this." Charming said, looking in his rear view mirror. "Emma, are you going to tell us what really happened to your finger?"

"I already told you, I cut it." Emma snapped.

"Tone." Snow warned her. "That much is obvious. Then you ignored it and now it's badly infected. The question is how did you cut it?" Snow clarified. Emma fell silent. "Emma." Snow told her. Emma remained silent. Charming began to think. Emma was normally pretty good at owning up to her own mistakes. She was a very honest little girl. She only ever lied or fell silent when someone else was involved or at fault.

"Did one of your friends hurt you?" He asked.

"What? No!" Emma said, wondering why he would even think that. Charming knew she wasn't lying.

"Ok, someone at school?" He further narrowed down.

"This didn't happen anywhere near school, ok?" Emma snapped. "It was an accident, it'll get fixed. Drop it." Emma's further reluctance to give details cemented for Charming that someone else was involved here. There was really only one main possible suspect left.

"Emma, was your brother involved?" Charming asked. Emma's face paled. She looked out the window.

"Emma, your father asked you a question." Snow said sternly. Emma remained silent. Even criminals had the right to remain silent. "Fine." Snow said coolly, pulling out her phone. "I'll call the school and have Neal talk to me instead…"

"No, wait." Emma said, panicking. If Neal opened his mouth he'd blab out every detail and make things worse for both of them. Charming and Snow shared a look as they pulled into a parking space at the hospital.

"Spill." Charming instructed her. "Everything." Emma sighed, trying to quickly work out how to phrase this all as innocently as possible.

"Neal and I were messing around in the kitchen when you two went to get bread at the weekend." Emma explained. "Neal grabbed what he thought was the spatula to use as a sword. He'd accidentally picked up the knife and cut me. I didn't want to get him into trouble so I hid it." Emma half confessed. Snow and Charming still weren't sure that was completely accurate, but they could cross-examine Neal later.

"Well at least we have a proper story to tell the staff now." Charming commented as they all got out. Emma shuffled behind her parents all the way into the building. She might have been mad at the time, but she still wasn't going to tattle on her little brother. After all, it had been an accident. Plus, it meant he owed her one, something useful for any sibling.