Ludwig closed the till as yet another customer moved away to wait for their drinks. His weekends had, since school ended for summer, become an endless round of monotony. It was admittedly better than sharing the house with Gilbert as he spent the day glued to various various games, and it was making saving up for a new laptop faster, but it was still dull. On Facebook, he could see the photos of people who'd friended him more out of obligation or to boost their friend count than anything resembling actual friendship. He could see them rock climbing or going out to parties or hiking in the Alps (although he had scrolled down quickly over Lutz's hiking photos, reporting them for nudity once out of sight) There were people he knew going off to exotic places halfway around the Earth and here he was, stuck behind the till at his local Starbucks in Berlin.
The next customer stepped forwards, not one of the regulars. Almost androgynous, small, smiling brightly.
"A tea, please! To drink in!" His German was heavily accented with a lilting tone that slightly twisted his mothertongue into something much more musical.
He nodded, already on it.
"With -" He faltered, face creasing as he thought hard. He looked over his shoulder to someone who looked very much like him. "Veee, Lovi? Come se dici -" (How do you say -)
The other one held up a hand. "Non lo so. Non mi importa." (Don't know. Don't care.)
The first one pouted and turned back to Ludwig. "Uh… with latte?"
Ludwig choked. Had he just said -? Surely not. "Could… could you repeat that for me?"
He smiled innocently up at the red, flustered German. "Tea… with latte!" He looked up and giggled. "É tutto rosso~" he said to the sullen teen who must have been his brother. Said sullen teen just rolled his eyes and pulled up a game on his phone, from what the now incredibly flustered and hot under the collar Ludwig could see. (He's all red~)
Yes, he'd heard things about Italians; he knew the stereotypes, but he still had no idea they were so… brazen about it! And that word - he only knew it from his brother, and it put him off-balance to hear it so casually said in a coffeeshop, of all places!
Studiously avoiding eye contact, he got the tray done, the tea ready and the small jug of milk on the side. Before he passed it to the foreigner, he hastily scribbled his name and number onto a napkin. The cheerful one paid, both went to an empty table, and Ludwig, red-faced, had to quickly get back into the right mindset to deal with the next customer.
From a post on tumblr: 'while I love gerita as much as the next person would I also like to remind everyone with domestic or coffee shop AUs that "latte" is not only italian for "milk" but also a somewhat crude German word for "erection"'