Just an AU that bit me while working on another oneshot
Holmes was juggling when I got home.
I stopped in the doorway, struggling not to laugh as my friend weaved around the room, seeking to stay beneath the balls he tossed into the air.
"Why are you trying to juggle?" I asked after watching him for a minute.
He fumbled. One landed on the table with a thump as he scowled at it, and I looked closer. Holmes was juggling apples, not balls. He directed his scowl at me when he noticed my smirk widen.
"Is this due to the clown we saw yesterday?" I asked. "I thought you said it was a worthless pastime?"
Our last case had ended at the local circus, and I had convinced him to walk with me as we watched the various performers go through their routines. It was worth listening to him grumble about the improbability of that display and the triviality of this performance to see the animals, watch the actors, and try to draw him into the show. He had affected a scowl for most of the afternoon, but after so many years, he could not fool me that easily. He had enjoyed it, if only as something to pick apart.
Finding him juggling in the sitting room the next day was further proof that he had enjoyed it, and his scowl deepened as I fought not to laugh.
"I told you I needed to add to my disguises," he answered, picking the apple back up and beginning again.
"I thought only children ran away to join the circus," I answered, still smirking as I moved toward the armchair he had pushed against the wall.
He harrumphed, dropping another one in the process, and tossed the apples onto his desk. When he joined me in putting the furniture back where it belonged, I glanced at his desk. The fruit was surely inedible by now, and I made a mental note to throw them out before they rotted in his desk.
"So why were you trying to juggle three apples?" I asked once the sitting room was back to how it was supposed to be.
"I told you: I need to add to my disguises." He leaned back in his chair, still scowling at the grin I tried to hide. "It looks easy."
I finally released the chuckle that had been building. "Perhaps you won't be so quick to judge the performance, now," I said with a smirk before adding, "and if you need to disguise yourself as a clown, you will have bigger problems than just not knowing how to juggle."
He raised an eyebrow, silently asking what I meant.
"Clowns are meant to be noticed, and a six-foot-tall clown will draw every child in the vicinity," I said simply. He pulled a face, and I chuckled again. "Besides, you would do better infiltrating the support than the performers. However much you hear about it, running away to join the circus is usually the last thing people do."
He studied me. "You never did."
"Of course not, but I had to talk a friend out of it a time or two. He fell for that old wives' tale and thought if he could only find one, he would not have to learn his father's trade."
A grin twitched his face. "People actually believe those?"
"Of course. How many times have you ranted about the crazy things people believe?"
He scowled at me, and I smirked again. My gaze landed on the bruised apples on his desk, and I pulled myself out of the chair and crossed the room.
"What are you doing?"
I did not answer immediately, picking up the apples to have two in my right hand.
"The key to juggling is how hard you throw the balls—or apples, in this case," I told him, thoroughly enjoying the surprise that flashed across his gaze. "Watch my hands."
Tossing the first apple nearly straight up, I quickly had all three apples rotating between my hands, none going higher than my forehead. It had been nearly twenty years since I had last juggled, but the surprise on his face was well worth it, especially when I started a yelp out of him by tossing one at his face.
He scowled at me for most of the afternoon, but he did let me teach him the technique, and I laughed heartily when I recognized a clown the next time a circus came into town.