Title: Teardown
Author: William Campbell Powell
Publisher: NineStar Press
Release Date: 12/10/2024
Heat Level: 2 – Fade to Black Sex
Pairing: M/NB
Length: 104100
Genre: Contemporary, literature/general fiction, contemporary, NB/nonbinary, pansexual, British, musicians, blues band, European music clubs, road trip, Germany, living rough, secrets, self-discovery
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Description
Growing up in a dead-end, Thames Valley town like Marden Combe, Kai knows there’s no escape without a lot of talent, hard work—and luck.
Two weeks before the Clayton Paul Blues Band plans to set out on tour to Germany, their singer quits, and drummer Kai takes matters in hand. With bandmates Jake and Jamie, they recruit a talented new singer—the enigmatic Dominique—as the new face of the band and set out on the road to Berlin in a rickety white van.
Dogged by mishaps and under-rehearsed, the band stumbles through their first shows, zig-zagging between chaos and brilliance. But as the first gig in Berlin draws near, the band begins to gel. They’re clicking with their audience, and even the stone-hearted Kai starts to crumble under the spell, first of Dom and then…of Lars.
As the end of the tour approaches, Kai must make hard choices. Dom? But she’s keeping a dark secret. Lars? Not after the acrimony of their last parting. The band? Or will that dream crumble too?
Teardown
William Campbell Powell © 2024
All Rights Reserved
We arrived in Köln late afternoon, and Neale’s satnav took us straight to the Club Lorelei.
It was a mistake to arrive at a venue in the daytime. In the daylight, any rock’n’roll club looked like the second half of Platoon. This club ran true to form, with peeling paint and grimy windows. It was locked, and nobody answered when we rang the bell or knocked.
From knocking, we progressed to banging. Then Neale climbed up onto a ledge to see if… I didn’t know what was going on in that Irishman’s brain. At that point, it was no great stretch of imagination for a neighbour to take a dislike to a scruffy rock’n’roll band making noise outside their apartment
Whatever. Well under five minutes later, I became aware that we weren’t alone. People in blue-black uniforms and stab-proof vests appeared. The uniforms bore the word Polizei embroidered on the right breast pocket flap. And each cop had a neatly holstered pistol strapped to their thigh. The man raised an authoritarian finger to his lips, and we could not move a muscle. I wasn’t sure we could even breathe. The woman glided to a spot just behind Neale.
Neale hadn’t noticed. He was investigating plant pots. Checking for hidden spare keys, I supposed.
Dominique, Jamie, and I still held our breath, waiting for disaster to strike.
“Stop what you are doing!”
The policewoman had spoken softly, but there was hissing steel in her voice, and Neale leaped about a foot in the air, swearing all the way. He twisted around as he came down and balled his fists. The policewoman had glided back a couple of feet beyond his reach. Her colleague had positioned himself off to one side, his bodycam presumably taking everything in.
It was sinking in, now, and Neale had turned pasty white.
“That is better. No need to startle. Ssso, tell me, what were you doing? Not breaking in, I hope.”
“We’re the band, Officer.” Neale pointed at Jake, who was miles away playing little blues runs on his acoustic guitar, oblivious to our little drama.
“And that is why you were climbing all over this building? And searching for what? An open window, a—what is the word—Schlüssel, a…”
“A key,” I offered helpfully, as talking was now permitted.
“Danke. Ja. Well. The club is empty. So, it is best if you drive away and come back when there is someone to let you in.”
“But…”
“The neighbours are disturbed. You will be playing loud rock tonight; they deserve some peace now.”
“You didn’t think, Neale, did you?” I suggested. “We’re all a little tired after a long drive, Officer. And we’re probably not thinking straight.”
She looked a little puzzled.
I translated for her in German that it had been a long journey, we were all tired, and apologised. I wasn’t sure if it helped.
I turned to Neale. “Say you’re very sorry.”
“Ah. Sure. Yes, I’m very sorry. Sure I am. Sorry. Yes, sorry. But…”
“Enough! There is no ‘but’. Your apology is sufficient. So, let me see your ID, and then you can all go.”
Fortunately, Neale had his passport in his jacket pocket. Mine was in my gilet. And Dominique and Jake both had theirs. Only Jamie needed to return to the van and rummage through his luggage.
“Good,” the policewoman said when we were all properly identified. She turned to Jamie. “Young man, I strongly advise you to keep your passport securely upon your person at all times. While it is not the law, it makes things easier in this country. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Officer. Thank you, Officer.”
“And now you have no cause to stay. I have checked your IDs, so the neighbours will see that I have done my duty. The neighbours said you were hippies and were smoking drugs. I do not smell drugs, so I think they were just making mischief. However, I see there are five of you, and your van has only three seats, unless it has been specially modified. Shall I inspect your van to see if it complies with the law? Do you understand now?”
We understood. Passports on our persons at all times. And stay on the right side of the neighbours.
“Jamie, Jake, why don’t you take Dominique and find a coffee shop nearby? Neale and I will go and find the campsite and set up the tent. We’ll meet you back here in an hour or so.”
Jamie grinned like a fool. It was so obvious he’d been waiting for a chance to spend some time with our gorgeous new singer. Jake, as far as Jamie was concerned, was no competition. I wasn’t so sure, myself. Jake could be a tongue-tied guitar geek most of the time, but he wasn’t a eunuch. He had better self-control than Jamie, that was all.
So, I drove off with Neale. He said nothing on the way to the campsite. It took us about twenty minutes; we were lucky we’d not had to drive through the city centre.
At the gate, I had a short ‘discussion’ with the owner. We’d booked in advance, but he was having second thoughts. He looked askance at our van and the gaffa tape now securing the broken mirror. We were third-class citizens in the camping world. But I guessed the summer hadn’t been kind, and the owner wanted our money more than he wanted us off his land—but not by much. He banished us to the far end of his campsite, past the shiny motorhomes and caravans with their awnings and well-maintained plots by the Rhine.
“It’s bloody miles away,” moaned Neale, his first words since we’d driven off together. He’d looked longingly at the bar as we passed it. It had been a long time since the liquid lunch on the ferry.
“We’ll live. Just don’t drink so much that you need to walk all the way back to pee.”
That earned me another black look.
The gods smiled on us, that and some thoughtful packing of the van. The tent I’d scrounged—the favour I’d redeemed on packing day—went up in about half an hour without a drop of rain despite the threatening clouds. The good, modern-design tent, which I’d borrowed from a friend, had cost him about a hundred quid on eBay. It unrolled without fuss; we pegged it in about ten places, and with about four guy ropes, we were done. We moved the sleeping bags and travel bags inside, zipped up the door, and headed to Club Lorelei.
By the time we got back, about an hour and a half in all, the doors were open and the place lit.
We went inside.
No Jamie. No Jake. No Dominique.
Herr Rumpel met us. Though tall and chubby, he had a harsh face that lacked only a monocle to cast him as a silk-talking villain. But his voice was fifty-a-day rough.
“You’re late. Are you going to be ready? And there should be four of you. I hired a rock band, not a duet.”
Rock band? Hmm. I looked around at the posters of The Who and the Rolling Stones, but also Black Sabbath, Metallica, Muse, plus some (presumably) German bands I didn’t recognise. Fair enough, we could pick some heavy blues that should work.
Rumpel waved at the stage—yes, even I could work that out, thank you—and stomped off without waiting for an answer. Neale and I got to work unloading the van. And work it was. We both had a fair old sheen on us by the time we were done, and I was seething, mostly at my brother who was doubtless still drinking coffee and chatting up Dominique.
We were nine parts set up when we heard English voices. Yep, it was Jamie, Jake, and Dominique. It didn’t escape my notice that Jamie and Dominique were holding hands. All three looked bright-eyed and excited.
“It was great,” Jamie bubbled. “We found a coffee shop, no problem, in a big square with a bunch of other shops and a load of shoppers walking past. Dominique said we should try to get some publicity for the gig. Jake had his acoustic guitar with him, so we started busking. I found a square of cardboard and wrote the name of the club on it.”
He held out the sign: Club ‘Lorrelie’.
I think he expected me to be pleased, and I sort of was. At least he hadn’t wasted the time we’d been away. But ‘Lorrelie’? No Jamie, it was Lorelei. The Maiden of the Rock. Hence, the sign outside the club of some weird rock chick in a low-cut chain mail fantasy of Rumpel’s. The artist had given her a guitar, vaguely Gibson SG-like, but had lavished more care on the flesh-revealing cutaways in the chain mail than the cutaways in the guitar.
“…we told lots of people about the gig,” Jamie was saying. “But we didn’t have any handbills.”
Oh, bugger. The handbills. We’d made up handbills for every gig, put them in the van. And I’d driven off with them. It wasn’t my fault, I wanted to say. I was tired because we’d driven a long way. I was flustered because the police were moving us on, and I had a lot to think about, trying to stop her arresting us. But it was my fault. I’d done so much of the organising that, somehow, I’d ended up a kind of leader or, at least, a leader for all the boring admin stuff. And when stuff went wrong, the leader was the one who took the blame.
So, I was all ready to blast Jamie, and I couldn’t. In fact, I was going to have to apologise.
“Well done, Jamie. Sorry I forgot to give you the handbills.”
Taste of ashes.
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William lives in a small Buckinghamshire village in England. By night, he writes contemporary, speculative, historical, crime and other fiction. His debut novel, Expiration Day, was published by Tor Teen in 2014 and won the 2015 Hal Clement Award for “Excellence in Children’s Science Fiction Literature”. His short fiction has appeared in Metastellar, DreamForge and other excellent ’zines. By day, William writes software for a living, and in the twilight, he sings tenor, plays guitar, and writes songs.
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