2Spooky

It was a very annoying thing for Sherlock, but John was enjoying himself, so the detective let it slide. And due to his lack of protest, the flat slowly became littered with more and more spider webs, skeletons (John thought it would be funny to put Sherlock’s skull out on the porch, but Sherlock put his foot down on that one), witches, and pumpkins. He’d even tried to get Sherlock to carve a pumpkin of his own.

“C’mon, Sherlock. It’d be fun! You can carve anything you want into it!” John had tried to give him a carving knife and pull him out of his Mind Palace and off of the couch.

“John, think over your last sentence, realize it is a bad idea, and let me be.” The genius didn’t even open his eyes, and with a sigh, John gave up and went back to carving the pumpkins.

Though Sherlock did not really want them in the flat, he had to admit the pumpkins turned out quite good. There was one carved as a scary face, one with a spider, and the three on the porch read ‘John’, ‘Sherlock’, and ‘221B’. The decorations weren’t the annoying part, however (Sherlock didn’t really pay attention to his surroundings at home, anyway, or he’d know when John had left and stop attempting to talk to him). The worst of it, was John’s determination to scare the detective.

Sherlock would be getting out of the shower, and as he opened his closet, John would be just behind the door with a ghoul mask on, and yell. His efforts were met with “Can you hand me my purple shirt?” Another time Sherlock had been going to eat breakfast, and there was a silver platter on the table. Thinking Mrs. Hudson had made biscuits, he opened the lid, and John’s bloody ‘severed head’ was unconscious on the plate. Sherlock only put a piece of toast in John’s mouth when he yelled, and put the lid back on. Yet another attempt was made at a crime scene. There had been a murder in a warehouse, and the place was draped in several tarps. Lestrade and Sherlock had been following a trail of blood drops, when John jumped out from behind a tarp and yelled “boo!”. Lestrade jumped a mile and grabbed on to Sherlock’s arm. The detective only rolled his eyes and said, “Detective Inspector, please release my coat. And John, why don’t you put this affinity for scaring to good use on Anderson.”

But John crossed a line when one of his scare tactics had ruined one of the genius’s experiments, so Sherlock silently declared war on his flat mate.

Halloween night was filled with a cool, crisp wind, and children poured through the London streets, dressed to the nines and to their little hearts’ content. John had decided he was going to dress up as a vampire and hand out candy to kids, and he was trying to convince Sherlock to help him.

But, in order to hand out sweets, the two had to have some available, so that morning, John went to Tesco to do the weekly shopping and to pick up a few bags of candy. When he returned, though, he began to panic. The furniture in the flat was overturned, papers were scattered everywhere, and one of the kitchen chairs had been broken. John set the shopping down immediately and called out into the flat. “Sherlock?” No response. He saw bloody handprints being drug across the wall towards Sherlock’s bedroom, and he slowly made his way in that direction. There were scuff marks on the floor, and places in the drywall where long-fingered hands had tried to get a grip on the wall paper. The bathroom door had a significant amount of blood splatter, and John was in full-on soldier mode now.

He pushed the door to Sherlock’s room open slowly, and rushed forward into the room when he saw the floor. The detective lay in a pool of blood, his throat slit cleanly and his silver eyes vacant and lost. When John leaned down to check his flatmate for a pulse, the ‘corpse’ jerked upright and yelled “boo!”.

John screamed, actually screamed, and reeled backwards, hitting the wooden floor boards with a ‘thump’. Sherlock sat up fully and fixed his friend with a smug look. “Are you done trying to scare me and mess up my experiments?”

John was furious now. “That’s what this was about? I leave for a half hour and you turn our flat into a bloody crime scene! Literally! You scared me to death! I thought you’d really been attacked, you prick!”

Sherlock just shrugged. “I don’t do things half-way John.”

“Yes you do. Getting dressed on the weekends, is one example.” John was starting to come down off the adrenaline and beginning to breathe properly again. “That’s some convincing corn syrup, I’ll admit.”

“It’s not corn syrup. I got it from the hospital yesterday. Happy Halloween.” A scary, twisted smile graced the cupid’s bow.

John put his head in his hands. “Sherlock, you can’t just-- Oh hell. I give up with you.” The detective stood and was rejected in his offer to help the doctor up, too. “You owe me now. Don’t give me that look, you had an experiment ruined, and I almost had another panic attack like the day you jumped. You’re an ass, and you owe me. Get the flat cleaned up, get the blood out of your hair, and your costume will be waiting on your bed. I’d hurry, the kids are going to start showing up in a few hours.

Three hours later, the blood was (mostly) scrubbed off the walls and floorboards, the living room had been righted, and the chair in the kitchen had been put back together. John was in his vampire costume, complete with fangs and red face paint dripping from the corners of his mouth. He’d sprayed his hair black, and smeared white paint on the rest of his face. “Sherlock, get out here! It’s almost seven!”

Sherlock begrudgingly emerged from his bedroom, his black boots thumping on the wood. He was clad in black pants, a beige tunic-style shirt, and a long brown and red over coat. A plastic sword swung from his hip, and a big, black, three point hat was fitted atop his curls. “A pirate, John. Really?” John only smiled and tossed him a bag of candy, just as the doorbell buzzed for the first trick-or-treaters of the evening.

The flatmates handed out candy to princesses, werewolves, superheroes, and even a brother and sister dressed as a dragon and a hobbit. But the best costume they saw for the whole night was donned by two twin boys who rang the bell around 8 o’clock. John opened the door by himself, Sherlock having refused to be asked one more time where his parrot was (“Pirates didn’t actually have parrots, John. At least, most of them didn’t.”). On the porch stood two seven year-old twin boys. One wore jeans, a black and white stripped jumper, and had a stethoscope draped around his neck. The other was in black suit pants, a white button down, a long black trench coat, and blue scarf. “Wow! It’s really you!” The miniature John squeaked.

“Our mom said you wouldn’t be giving out candy, but she said we could try anyway.” The ‘Sherlock’ chimed in now. “I like your vampire costume!”

John found himself grinning from ear-to-ear. “I like your costumes, too. One moment.” He turned away from the door and called up the stairs. “Sherlock! Come here! And if you’ve taken your costume off, I’ll kill you.”

Sherlock’s boots stomped heavily down the stairs. “What, John?”

“Look at these costumes.” He opened the door all the way so Sherlock could see the tiny doppelgängers on the porch.

“Wow!” Both of them exclaimed.

“We’re big fans, Misters.” ‘John’ said.

“Obviously.” Sherlock said, earning him an elbow to the rib cage.

“I wanted to wear the hat, but I couldn’t really find one.” The ‘Sherlock’ said as John dropped candy into their baskets.

“I don’t wear--” The taller Sherlock was stopped by a glare from John. He sighed heavily. “Here, take this one.” He pulled the deer stalker off the rack in the hallway, and plopped it on the kid’s head.

John thought the kid’s eyes were going to explode out of his head for a moment there, and he couldn’t help but chuckle to himself, before noticing the glimmer of disappointment on the twin’s face. John’s medical bag was right next to the door, and he riffled through it before finding one of his old red cross bands. He knelt down and told the kid to hold his arm out. He slid the band up the small arm, and said, “You can’t be John Watson without one of these.” He winked to the kid, who was gaping in amazement at his arm.

“James! Jackson! Let’s go already!” A teenage girl called irritably from the sidewalk.

“Bye misters! Thank you for everything!” The twins jumped down the stairs and took off at a sprint down the street, causing their sister to yell out and chase after.

John laughed as he shut the door and turned the porch light off. “They were cute.” Sherlock just shrugged. “Oh come on,” John nudged him, “Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy having someone dress up as you for Halloween.”

Sherlock finally smiled. “It was kind of nice. And I got rid of that bloody hat, too.”

“That was really nice of you, Sherlock.”

The detective waved it off and began climbing the stairs again. “I’m going to change out of this. The pants are too breezy for my taste. Tea?”

“I’d love some.” He caught a look from Sherlock. “Fine, I’ll make it. But just this once.”

The two began to laugh, because they both knew that wasn’t true. “Happy Halloween, John.”

“Happy Halloween.”