Frodo coupled the argument with his most pitiful and wide-eyed stare and a slightly jutting lower lip, but Rosie was well accustomed, long immune and utterly unimpressed when it came to the persuasive powers of Frodo's pout.
"First of all, that cut's never infected, it's just turning rainbow-shaded because it's covered in ink, which is making it sore and red and causing your dramatics. Next, if I allow you to convince me that honey's a good cure for it, then you'll take every chance you can to think up ridiculous treatments in the future." Rosie ticked her reasons off on her fingers, her smile verging on a laugh with every word. "And you'll go back to your books, 'wounded' finger and all, and get honey all over, and then you'll be sticky for days."
Frodo nursed the finger in question, the skin broken by a long paper cut from knuckle to nail, and looked at Rosie reproachfully.
"You could lick it clean before I go back to work, then."
"If I lick it off, how will the honey do any good at fighting that infection you insist is there?"
Frodo paused, looking for a route around the solid and unmoving mountain of logic in Rosie's arguments. "It would make me feel better?" he hazarded, making sure he was out of range of any flicked tea towels. Rosie didn't appear to have anything at hand she could thwap out at him, but after ten years Frodo had learnt that there was always something nearby that would do in a pinch when Rosie felt he was being exasperating.
"You of all people should know what a hurt finger feels like, dear, and that's not a hurt finger." Rosie let her laughter fall freely, and gave the injured finger a soft kiss. "There, is that better? The little boys always feel properly repaired when I do that."
"Oh, I think I'll survive," Frodo said.
~