When I answered his call not even seconds after I sent the text, Leo was laughing. No, giggling would be the correct term, and I knew exactly why.

"Ha. Ha. Very funny," I said dryly and with a handful of saltiness, foregoing any form of greetings.

"I usually hate typos," he says. "But this time I'll make an exception. Dear lord, that was hilarious!"

"You done?" I raised a brow even though he couldn't see, a bit surprised at myself for not being as nervous as I thought I would be.

"Give me a sec..." Then he falls into another bout of laughter that was so contagious I found myself laughing along with him.

It was like P.E. all over again in that moment. Because suddenly, he wasn't Leonardo Bracci, our school's unreachable Golden Boy. No. At that moment he was just Leo, the insanely attractive guy who accidentally sent me his nudes who liked romance novels.

It took us a while to come down from our laughing high, but when we did, there were tears at the corners of my eyes and a cheek-aching smile on my face.

"You know," Leo sniffed, his voice still holding a hint of mirth and was obviously in the same boat as me. He continued, "You have a very nice laugh. Kind of...husky. Like your voice."

Why, hello there, blush. Welcome back. "Sh-Should I be flattered or insulted."

He snorted. "Flattered obviously."

"Well, then." I paused for a dramatic effect regaining some of my composure. "I like your laugh, too, so...we're even."

"You're too kind, my lady." He said with a bad imitation of a posh accent that made me cringe and almost fall back into another fit of laughter.

Faking a shudder even though he couldn't see, I said, "Oh god, please don't ever do that again!"

"What? I think I did great! I should join my school's drama club."

"No!" I laughed again, my mind coming up with the image of Leonardo Bracci playing a Shakespeare character doing over the top movements. "Please, for the sake of the world, don't!"

He huffed on the other end. "Fine. But only because you asked oh so nicely."

There was a brief pause in the conversation where we both chuckled. Leo was first to speak. "Hey, Justine...tell me something about yourself."

"Why?" The question was out of my mouth before I could even think about it.

He chuckled again. "I just want to get to know you better. Is that so bad?"

"Well...no..." I bit the inside of my lip as the nerves came back.

"How about this." I heard some rustling on his end, as if he was moving around. "You tell me one thing about yourself, and I'll do the same in return. Sound good?"

That was actually a good deal. And there was the small fact that I was becoming more and more curious about this side of Leo. I wouldn't say he acts differently at school, because he doesn't, but the majority of what I knew about him was second hand. I wanted to get to know Leo from himself.

"I like reading romance novels as well, but not that much. I prefer smutty ones, though."

Silence met my confession, and I started fidgeting. I opened my mouth to say something, anything really, but then he spoke.

"I'm changing your name in my phone to Soulmate."

Oh, boy.

* * *

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