The night was quiet. Sam was making good progress with the work and hadn't discovered a single talker yet.
He still had two incidents to work through and then he was able to relax until the end of his shift.
"Du dummes Stück Scheiße! Jetzt arbeite doch endlich!"
Sam jumped up and looked in the direction the screaming was coming from. Colin sat at Gwen's computer and pressed the spacebar several times impatiently. Apparently, there were some problems again that were getting to Colin's last nerve.
Over the last few days, Sam learned that Colin wasn't actually that scary and was just completely done with Freddy. The two had actually had some nice conversations in the break room and Sam was developing something of a fondness for Colin's Scottish accent. He couldn't explain why, but every time he heard the IT guy speak, a pleasant tingle ran down his spine and he began to secretly look forward to their next conversation.
"Ich schwöre, dass ich dich in den nächsten Fluss werfe den ich finde kann, wenn du nicht anfängst zu kooperieren!"
Colin's voice had gone from angry and annoyed to pure desperation.
Sam had only now realized that he couldn't understand a word the IT guy was saying, and something stirred within him.
The office worker knew that Colin was learning German in hopes of better understanding the code, but this was the first time he had heard him actually speak German. And even though Colin was most likely cursing and yelling at the computer, Sam was mesmerized.
Maybe it was the fact that Sam couldn't understand him, which gave him an air of mystery. Colin could whisper the sweetest things and Sam would never know it.
"Do you need anything, Sonnenschein?"
Sam didn't notice that the Scot was now looking directly at him. Had he been staring for long? Sam felt the heat rush to his face.
He wanted to say something but was interrupted by Norris.
The office worker wanted to pause the computer voice and explain himself to the IT guy, but he had turned back to Gwen's computer and was pounding on the keys in annoyance.
This was probably Sam's signal to take a break. Norris chose a long Reddit post today.
In the break room he found Alice, sitting comfortably at the table and looking intently at her cell phone. Sam suspected that she was trying to beat her high score in Flappy Bird again. After the app was removed from the stores in 2014, Alice somehow managed to transfer the app to every new phone and continues to play it religiously to this day.
Without disturbing her, Sam made a beeline for the coffee machine and turned it on.
"No! I was so close!" Alice groaned in annoyance and drank the rest of her coffee.
"Still haven't reached two hundred?"
Alice didn't say anything and just shook her head as she stared at her phone. She was probably wondering whether it was worth starting again or whether she should do it after work.
"Considering that you've been carrying the app around for a decade, one would assume that you should at least have a higher high score."
"Oh, be quiet!" Alice shouted, throwing a crumpled napkin at her colleague. "This is not an app! It's an extreme sport!"
"Whatever you say," Sam replied, leaning against the wall as he waited for the coffee to be ready. "Say. Do you know what's going on with Colin?"
Alice was staring at her phone again and judging by the movement of her hand, she was back on Tumblr. "What do you mean?"
"He speaks German!"
"Oh that!" she laughed. "Colin got pretty mean to Freddy yesterday and Lena banned him from swearing for the rest of the week."
"And that's why he speaks German?"
"Nobody understands it except him, so he can just say that he talks very aggressively about puppies and unicorns."
"Huh..."
Alice shrugged. "Use every loophole you can find!"
When the coffee was finally ready, Alice made her way back to her desk, leaving her new colleague alone in the break room.
As Sam poured himself a cup, his thoughts turned back to Colin.
He could feel his face heating up again and he had to face the fact that he was definitely falling for the Scotsman. A frightening thought, but there was something exciting about it.
Sam was so deep in thought that he didn't even notice that Colin had entered the break room, causing him to jump to the side in shock as the taller man opened one of the cupboards to retrieve a cup.
To stay out of the way, Sam sat at one of the tables and watched Colin over the rim of his coffee cup.
"Dir gefällt es also, dass ich Deutsch spreche?"
Sam froze.
"Du brauchst nicht Mal zu antworten, denn ich kann es an deinem Gesicht sehen" Colin didn't even have to look over at Sam to know that he looked like a deer in headlights.
"Ich hatte schon bemerkte, dass sobald ich den Mund aufmache, du mir an den Lippen hängst wie ein Besessener. Doch sobald ich Deutsch spreche, siehst du mich an, als würde ich das schönste Gedicht zitieren, dass du jemals gehört hattest."
Sam didn't understand a single word and he hated it. He really wanted to know what the Scotsman was babbling about.
"Mein Sonnenschein, du bist hier das Einzige, was mich noch bei Verstand hält."
Colin looked over at Sam and gave him a gentle smile before disappearing from the room with his tea. Sam was left behind. In love and yearning.
Translation: - "Du dummes Stück Scheiße! Jetzt arbeite doch endlich!" = "You stupid piece of shit! Start working!" - "Ich schwöre, dass ich dich in den nächsten Fluss werfe den ich finde kann, wenn du nicht anfängst zu kooperieren!" = "I swear that if you don't start cooperating, I'll throw you into the nearest river I can find!" - Sonnenschein = sunshine - "Dir gefällt es also, dass ich Deutsch spreche?" = "So you like that I speak German?" - "Du brauchst nicht Mal zu antworten, denn ich kann es an deinem Gesicht sehen" = "You don't even have to answer because I can see it on your face" - "Ich hatte schon bemerkte, dass sobald ich den Mund aufmache, du mir an den Lippen hängst wie ein Besessener. Doch sobald ich Deutsch spreche, siehst du mich an, als würde ich das schönste Gedicht zitieren, dass du jemals gehört hattest." = "I had already noticed that as soon as I opened my mouth, you hung on my every word like a man possessed. But as soon as I speak German, you look at me as if I were quoting the most beautiful poem you had ever heard." - "Mein Sonnenschein, du bist hier das Einzige, was mich noch bei Verstand hält." = "My sunshine, you are the only thing that keeps me sane here."