Page 9 of All I Want Is Love
“Don’t you have work?” Leo asks.
“I called my assistant,” I answer honestly. “She will fill in for me until lunch.”
“I am so sorry. You had to change your plans just for me.”
“What are you talking about? Obviously, I am here for Barkley.”
Barkley grunts at hearing his name, sitting up and letting his tongue hang out. Leo smiles. “Barkley says thank you.” He pauses. “Seriously, ever since we met, I have shown you my worst.”
“If that’s your worst, it can’t be that bad.”
“Come on, I am a mess,” he says.
“Well, better a hot mess than a lukewarm disaster. At least you aremessmerizing,” I say before I can stop myself. I just have the ability to make the worst jokes and alienate everyone I would even remotely be interested in. It’s just overall easier for me to handle animals than humans, especially once they get in touch with my weird humor.
Leo stares at me, then he snorts. “Did you just really make that joke?”
“I know, I am just so unfunny. Robin keeps telling me my jokes are so from the 2000s when everyone was wearing shirts with not-so-funny quotes from Facebook.”
“Before memes were a thing,” Leo analyzes. He seems to have recovered fully from his panic attack and also momentarily forgets to be awkward around me. “So, you like jokes?”
“No one finds funny what I find funny.”
“Give me one,” he urges, his eyes looking at me with so much hope in them. I don’t have it in me to turn him down. Way to go and ruin my cool image for real.
“What’s a can opener that doesn’t work?”
He blinks at me. “No clue.”
“A can’t opener.”
It’s so silent around us, I can hear a needle drop. Then Leo slaps his hands in front of his face and chuckles.
“Two carrots are sitting in the fridge. Says one carrot to the other: ‘It’s pretty cold in here, huh?’ The other one blurts out: Oh no, a talking carrot!”
“Oh my god,” Leo says. “This one is so bad!” His chuckle betrays him, though.
My God, I might have just found the one guy who shares my humor instead of scrunching his nose and looking for somebody better!
“You just found me funny,” I point out, leaning forward to look at him closer.
“Not at all,” Leo says, flushing slightly. Then, however, he smiles. “Okay, a bit.”
“So, now that I have embarrassed myself. Does Barkley want me to stay for breakfast?”
“Yes, he does,” Leo says.
I want to ask him what triggered him, mainly to avoid it in the future. I can’t stop him from seeing something when we are out, but I can at least avoid the topic. However, our exchange has clearly changed his mood, and I don’t want to sour it again.
*LEO*
Soren is tall and handsome, he even looks a tad stoic and serious, but then he comes running to me to help me withmy panic attack; he doesn’t ask any questions and tells me theunfunniestjokes I have ever heard.
He took me completely by surprise, so much so that I forgot to be awkward around him. I even forgot to be anxious.
Right now, he is just looking so kind, shuffling around my kitchen confidently telling me another silly joke and not minding that he is making a doofus out of himself.
His confidence in himself and the way he isn’t embarrassed to show me who he is is truly something I could probably learn from him.
