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Since he was new to the states, Emiliano decided that he would like to try any and all things that even held an iota of his interest. Star fruit was something that's always been on his list of things to try and today was going to be the day he crossed that off of his list. At first, he thought about inviting Cass to come with him because apparently having twins was a whole family affair that lasted forever [Honestly they already had two, why did they want two more?]. While he was happy Mercy and the babies are healthy, the amount of times he’s seen her mother, father, friends, and other family over was staggering. Poor Cass looked like he was one step away from snapping and while he wanted to help him out, stepping out for some air seemed better.

Which is how he currently ended up at the fruit stand where the star fruit is.

How many should he get? Logic states that one would suffice since he wasn't sure if he would even like it. Once that was settled, he quickly paid for the fruit, all prepared to bite into it.

Leah saw the star fruit craze on instagram of all places … lots of girlies from the highschool and the college posting aesthetic pics of them sporting the star shaped freckles. It was weird, but far from the weirdest thing she’d seen in Destiny City and seemed pretty harmless so Leah decided to go see what all the hype was about.

She walked up the stand, humming to the music playing in her ears. She pulled out one of her airpods and gave the vendor a smile asking for one of the fruits and looking the thing over in her hands. Nothing seemed to be particularly special about the fruit, so she shrugged and took a bite.

The fruit was pretty good, was the first thing she noticed and honestly she hadn't thought to look for videos to see if the fruit was actually any good. She was really glad it wasn't terrible, taking another bite wondering just how long the freckles took to appear.

The moment he took a bite, Emiliano couldn't stop eating it. It was so good! If he ever paid attention to instagram [tiktok is where he is usually at with all the thirst trap posts he has], he would have eaten more slowly. Either way, he didn't see the trend going around…But he did see a somewhat familiar face coming up to the fruit stand. Gray eyes narrowed while he tried to figure out where he knew this familiar face…Oh! This was Mercy’s cousin right?! Taking another bite of the fruit, Emiliano waited for Ash to come to the stall. He was going to say hello when he heard her humming, signifying the fact that she was probably listening to music.

Instead of trying to figure out the best way to approach her, Emili simply gave her a friendly wave to get her attention, pushing his sunglasses up to rest on the top of his head. Maybe he should have put his hair up today? It was mildly hot.

Leah noticed Emiliano half way through her fruit and right as she started to basically break out in star shaped freckles. She waved at him and smiled, they mostly saw each other in passing especially with how crowded the Giordano house seemed to be of late. Leah loved her cousin and her babies, but she had enough helping hands at the moment. She walked over not even noticing the little star shaped freckles that now littered her skin.

“Did you escape the baby visitor train,” she asked, still unaware of the freckles before her jaw dropped as Emiliano started to sport the same star-shaped freckles.

“Oh s**t, it actually works,” she said before looking down to arms and grinning. “This is awesome, you got to take a picture with me.”

What the hell was going on with her face?!

Emili slowly nodded to her question then raised an eyebrow at her statement. “What actually works? Have you seen your face?” He blinked then nodded slowly, never one to pass up an opportunity for a picture, Emili posed with Leah and promptly noticed that the same thing was on his face too. Of course he would wait till after the picture to freak out, thinking he may have gotten a weird skin disease from eating the starfruit. “I don't usually have star freckles on my face….” He blinked then looked at the little bit of fruit he had left, questioning it in Italian. “This isn't permanent is it?!” To be fair he could roll with it, which would make his tiktoks a little more interesting.

Leah grinned, making a cute face with a peace sign, before snapping a picture of herself and Emiliano. She gave him a look when he started to freak out a little. “Really, dude it's all over the internet. Instagram is teaming with cute photos of girls with star freckles.”

She pointed back to the stand they moved a bit away from, “why do you think they are so busy? The fruit is good, but not that good … but no it's not permanent. Though I'm not sure how long it last, so maybe don’t go home and freak out the family, yeah?”

She took another bite of her star fruit, aiming to finish it off and realizing it would likely prolong the reaction a little bit since she didn't eat it all in one go.

Well that would be why he didn't exactly hear about this trend.

Eh, he's not an instagram person.

He did roll his eyes, but shook his head. Sucks that this wasn't a permanent thing, but whatever. He promptly finished off his fruit and decided to post to tiktok with his new temporary look. Once he posted with the right tags, THAT'S when he saw the trend… “Oh! I have seen this….” he wasn't going to admit that he just kept swiping since some of the girls on there admittedly didn't look all that attractive ... .Had he said that out loud, he would have sounded like an a*****e since everyone is beautiful or some s**t like that.

Leah was here so maybe they could hang out a bit? Smart mouth aside she was actually fun to be around from what he gathered at his cousin’s house. She was also one of the only people he knew off that was close to his age [everyone he knew in the negaverse didn't count right now]. “Do you have any plans today? Other than trying to look cute with star freckles?”

Leah raised a brow as Emiliano opened tiktok and proceeded to start recording a video right then and there. She watched for a second and recognized the trend immediately and so she slid right into the video and did the end of the dance with him, laughing after a moment at the face he was making.

She grinned at him and before bending down to fix her shoe, when he asked her if she had any plans for the day. She looked up and smirked, “awwww, you think I'm cute.”

She stood up and shook her head, “nothing in particular planned, have you been to Hindsight yet?”

He wasn't expecting her to pop into his video, but that was something he didn't mind in the slightest. There would be some questioning comments but it's not like he really answered them anyway. Emili tried, he really did, not to look at Leah while she bent down to fix her show but he was indeed male and well…Genetics definitely did her a solid. That was all he was going to even think about, lest he find himself in trouble. At her teasing, he decided to be honest, giving her a flirty grin. “Of course, who wouldn't? No, I haven't been to Hindsight yet, is that our next destination?”

Leah could feel her cheeks heat up at his blatant flirting and smirked, “I hope you can sing.” She gave him a wink and headed off toward her car. “Hindsight is a karaoke bar and lounge, you can drink right?”


She was walking backwards with smiling eyes and a flirty grin of her own. Today was shaping up to be a really fun day and now she was headed to one of her favorite hang out spots to sing, drink and dance. She couldn't ask for a better summer day. Well beach days aside. “Come on, slow poke.”