and you can't say where it ends and you begin
The original post in here of my cornerflag story has turned into somewhat of a German football fandom primer, which is awesome and I love doing it. (More to come!) But I've also been working on doing more of the actual story, as well. I don't have much at this point, but I've introduced some new characters and situations. Now I just need to figure out what to do after this.
“Now go, go.” Philipp shooed Bastian away with the paper. “I’ve got evening plans, and a lot to do before then.”
“Seeing your boyfriend?” Bastian teased as he stood.
Philipp glared. “He’s not my boyfriend.”
“Why not?” Bastian retied his scarf, managing to sound both reasonable and assholeish at the same time.
“C’mon, Basti, you know why.” Philipp returned his focus to his email. He’d had this discussion just about every week since Bastian found out he played pool with Arne on Thursdays. It was sort of cute, in that annoying Bastian way. “And he wouldn’t be anyway, even if he didn’t work for the label.”
“So why do you even go?”
“You’re terrible at pool.” Philipp looked up from his computer and grinned at Bastian’s outraged face. “Sorry, but you are. I like a good challenge every once in a while.”
“Jerk.”
“Jerk that is good at pool,” Philipp replied. “Now get out of here. I’ll be in the studio tomorrow morning to see how Manuel settles in, but I can’t be there the whole day, so I’m trusting you to be civil and constructive in the afternoon.”
“I am perfectly capable of being civil and constructive, but if Arjen-“
“Good.” Philipp cut him off. Bastian and Arjen only got along half the time, but Arjen was enough of a wizard of a producer that it was worth it. “See you tomorrow, Basti.”
* * * * *
The bar he always met Arne at wasn’t much, but it was comfortable and had a couple of pool tables. There were fancier places in the city, real pool halls, with snooker and everything. Philipp even had a better table in his own house, but it was nicer to be here, with the brown walls and soft murmurs and unhip jukebox.
“He’s totally gay in the second one,” Arne said as Philipp lined up his shot.
“But not in the third one.” Philipp sunk the ball with a satisfied smirk and moved to figure out the next one.
“Because the second one was too gay.” Arne grinned, leaning against the wall as Philipp missed his next attempt. “No one wants to see a gay Jason Statham movie.”
“I want to see a gay Jason Statham movie.” Philipp picked up his beer, half-empty already.
“Well, obviously. So would I.” Arne laughed as he attempted his shot. “But the studio probably doesn’t want to put that out, no matter how many times you’d go see it.”
“The DVD sales, though…”
“Astronomical,” Arne agreed.
“One for every room in the house.” Philipp chalked his cue leisurely as he surveyed the table. He always had these sorts of conversations with Arne, ones that didn’t relate to anything but television or movies or other ephemeral nonsense. Arne worked for the label and Philipp didn’t want to let him know about anything that had to do with the work he did with Bastian. The less the label knew, Philipp had found, the better. Which meant he had to come up with something besides his job to talk about, and somehow, half the time that meant Jason Statham movies. He wasn’t sure if that was Arne’s doing or his.
“And Christmas gifts.”
Philipp laughed at that, nearly dropping his cue. “Can you imagine? Merry Christmas, Mom, it’s that gay Jason Statham movie you always wanted…”
“I didn’t mean for your mom.” Arne snorted and shook his head. “Don’t you have other people to give presents to?”
“Well, I’m assuming you’d already have it, of course, and Andreas probably would as well…”
“How is Andreas, by the way?”
“Moving to Berlin.” Philipp made a face and finally sunk the 6-ball that had been bothering him. “At the end of the month.”
“Wow.” Arne looked somewhat surprised. “Sudden.”
“Not really.” Philipp shrugged and huffed as he missed the next shot. It had been nearly perfect, too. “I knew he had an interview with a design firm up there, and it was pretty much ‘yeah, we want you, see you in two weeks’ after that.”
“Does he have a place to live?” Arne surveyed the table, but flicked his eyes back up to Philipp as he spoke.
“He’s staying with a friend of ours at first.” Philipp leaned on his cue, trying not to laugh at the thought of Andreas and Christian in the same apartment. It was mean of him, and Andreas didn’t deserve that. “And if they don’t kill each other, he’ll find his own place.”
“Some friend.” Arne smoothly knocked the ball into the side pocket. Philipp was still winning, but it was getting close.
“Andreas says he’s gotten better.” Philipp frowned, thinking about Christian. He didn’t like that he had no idea whether Andreas was right or not. He hadn’t talked to Christian in a long time. He’d lost contact with so many people from his pre-management life. It wasn’t that he particularly missed Christian, who he’d always been suspicious of, but it was that Andreas still knew him, was still in touch with all the people that had faded out of Philipp’s life as his career had taken hold.
“Not convinced?”
“I don’t know.” Philipp took his place at the table. “Andreas is probably right. Besides, I’m sure he’ll find a place of his own quickly enough.”
* * * * *
Manuel was actually on time, which was another addition to his “pro” column, not that he needed it now. Philipp already knew that he did fantastic things with the bass, that Arjen was already excited to work with him, and that he already got along well with Bastian and the rest. He was more expensive than Hans-Jörg, but Philipp was of the opinion that Bastian needed to have the best around him.
“Manuel. Welcome.” Philipp smiled and shook his hand. The bassist was wearing an odd sort of cardigan that Philipp was sure was fashionable. It was nothing that Philipp himself would ever wear, which was always the way to tell. “Did you find everything okay?”
“Yes, your directions were very detailed.”
“Good. Good.” Philipp beamed at the compliment, leading Manuel into the studio proper. It was one of the older studios in Munich. Arjen liked to boast that Giorgio Moroder had recorded there. Whether that was true or not, Philipp had no idea, but it was nice to believe. “Let me introduce you around. Of course, you know Mario.”
“Manu!” Mario put his coffee down and unfolded his long legs, standing and kissing Manuel on his cheek and ruffling his hair affectionately. “You made it. I hope Philipp isn’t scaring you off already.”
“No, he’s been very nice. Very helpful.” Manuel beamed at Mario brightly. “Your hair looks great!”
Philipp watched them chat with a certain interest. He knew that Manuel and Mario had been friends, their world was fairly small, but he hadn’t realized they were so close. It was good, but worth keeping an eye on anyway. Mario and Bastian had a dynamic that Philipp didn’t want to disturb. Band chemistry was a difficult thing to get right. “Shall we continue?”
Manuel turned back to him with a bright grin. “Yeah! I want to meet everyone.”
Philipp shot down Mario’s snicker with a glare. He didn’t want to drive Manuel’s enthusiasm out of him on the first day. “Bastian and Arjen should-“
“Hi Mom!” Thomas bounced through the room, ruffling Philipp’s hair and getting smacked away by Mario before he could do the same to him.
“Thomas. You’re late.” Philipp attempted to press his hair back down.
“Yeah, but less late.” Thomas beamed with absolutely no remorse. “Hi! You’re Manuel, yeah? I’m Thomas.”
“Hi.” Manuel shook Thomas’ offered hand, not looking too startled by his arrival.
“Great to have you. Mom, I’m getting a Coke, be in in a sec!” Thomas bounded off towards the kitchen.
“Mom?” Manuel asked, doing a remarkable job in holding back his laughter.
“Oh yeah, we call him that. He hates it.” Mario slung his arm companionably around Manuel’s shoulders.
Philipp sighed long-sufferingly. “Anyway, the recording rooms are this way.”
Arjen and Bastian were discussing something animatedly when the group walked into the control room, but it didn’t sound angry. Small mercies, Philipp supposed. “Arjen? Bastian? Manuel is here.”
“Manu!” Bastian smiled his best pop-star smile and shook the bassist’s hand. “Glad you’re here.”
“Glad to be here.”
“Hope you don’t mind that we throw you right into it, but Arjen has this idea for the bass line on the song we’re working on, and he’s kind of insistent about it…”
“I just want to hear it properly.” Arjen, a Dutch man in flashy clothes whose baldness made him look years older than he was, stepped out of the control room with a somewhat pissy glare to Bastian. “And I hear you’re good. Hi.”
“Hello.” Manuel waved a bit to Arjen.
“He’s great. C’mon, he’ll show you.” Bastian flashed a grin at Philipp before leading Manuel to the instrument rooms.
That had gone easier than Philipp was anticipating, and he knew he shouldn’t be shocked by Bastian listening to him, but it still felt like a novelty. He let the musicians go and returned to the lounge, pulling out his Blackberry as he sat down. Alaba had sent over the revised schedule for Badstuber’s photo shoot. Philipp had resisted getting an assistant, but Bastian had refused to lend his support to the Badstuber project if he didn’t get one. Launching Holger Badstuber as a pop star relied on Bastian’s support, both publically and not, and so he’d relented.
He hated to admit it but he was glad that he had. David Alaba was an eager young Austrian with good organizational skills and boundless energy. His routing and re-routing of emails alone made Philipp’s life much less stressful. Having David also made him seem more professional, he’d found. That he could tell people to send things to his assistant made them take him more seriously. Appearances mattered in this business.
He tapped out a response, then called up his calendar app to make tweaks. It would be a busy few months, and Philipp was itching with the chance to prove himself again.
* * * * *
“It doesn’t seem like that much, in here.”
Philipp shrugged and looked at the pile of boxes and disassembled furniture now taking up a corner of his basement. “It’s because I haven’t got around to putting anything else in here,” he said with a sigh. “I had such plans…”
“Well, I’m glad you haven’t gotten to them yet.” Andreas grinned. “Thank you again, by the way.”
“No problem.” Philipp smiled back at Andreas, feeling oddly melancholy. “I mean, I’ve got the room, right?”
“What are you going to put in here?”
“The pool table.” Philipp wrinkled his nose, gazing at the corner where he had been planning to put it, when he bought it. “And I actually wanted a bar down here, you know? Put some taps in, maybe. I saw something like that in a movie once.”
“Oh, that’d be nice!” Andreas enthused, patting one of the boxes fondly. “Put in a good television, a sound system…worth coming back from Berlin for.”
“And the Wii.” Philipp signed heavily and turned to go up the stairs. It would have been great, but he’d been far too busy to do something like that. He wasn’t sure who he’d have over, after all, with Andreas leaving. It was hard to picture Bastian or Mario playing pool in anyone’s basement, much less his.
“Yeah! Lots of room.”
Philipp padded into the kitchen and started the water boiler. “I have nothing but room all over.”
“So if I come running home, you’ll put me up?” Andreas slid into a stool and propped his chin up on his hands.
“Of course. But you won’t.” Philipp leaned on the counter, one ear focused on the drip of the machine. “You’ll be fantastic. Berlin won’t know what hit it.”
“I hope so. It’s just kind of weird, you know? Really leaving.”
“Yeah.” Philipp looked at his hands, feeling somewhat lost. “So you really don’t want to come back someday?”
“You never know.” Andreas shrugged. “But, I’m not planning it, you know? I’m going to make my life there, hopefully.”
Philipp poured the water over the tea bags, passing Andreas’ mug over to him to prepare. He never got the milk ratio right. “I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too. But it’s just Berlin. And you go up there pretty often, don’t you?”
“Once a month, maybe?” Philipp didn’t particularly like Berlin, but he did have to go for business. He liked Hamburg better. He loved Munich, his home.
“We’ll have lunch or beer or something, then.”
“Yeah,” Philipp replied, something twisting in him a little. He didn’t want Andreas to disappear, too. “Yeah, definitely.”
“Now go, go.” Philipp shooed Bastian away with the paper. “I’ve got evening plans, and a lot to do before then.”
“Seeing your boyfriend?” Bastian teased as he stood.
Philipp glared. “He’s not my boyfriend.”
“Why not?” Bastian retied his scarf, managing to sound both reasonable and assholeish at the same time.
“C’mon, Basti, you know why.” Philipp returned his focus to his email. He’d had this discussion just about every week since Bastian found out he played pool with Arne on Thursdays. It was sort of cute, in that annoying Bastian way. “And he wouldn’t be anyway, even if he didn’t work for the label.”
“So why do you even go?”
“You’re terrible at pool.” Philipp looked up from his computer and grinned at Bastian’s outraged face. “Sorry, but you are. I like a good challenge every once in a while.”
“Jerk.”
“Jerk that is good at pool,” Philipp replied. “Now get out of here. I’ll be in the studio tomorrow morning to see how Manuel settles in, but I can’t be there the whole day, so I’m trusting you to be civil and constructive in the afternoon.”
“I am perfectly capable of being civil and constructive, but if Arjen-“
“Good.” Philipp cut him off. Bastian and Arjen only got along half the time, but Arjen was enough of a wizard of a producer that it was worth it. “See you tomorrow, Basti.”
* * * * *
The bar he always met Arne at wasn’t much, but it was comfortable and had a couple of pool tables. There were fancier places in the city, real pool halls, with snooker and everything. Philipp even had a better table in his own house, but it was nicer to be here, with the brown walls and soft murmurs and unhip jukebox.
“He’s totally gay in the second one,” Arne said as Philipp lined up his shot.
“But not in the third one.” Philipp sunk the ball with a satisfied smirk and moved to figure out the next one.
“Because the second one was too gay.” Arne grinned, leaning against the wall as Philipp missed his next attempt. “No one wants to see a gay Jason Statham movie.”
“I want to see a gay Jason Statham movie.” Philipp picked up his beer, half-empty already.
“Well, obviously. So would I.” Arne laughed as he attempted his shot. “But the studio probably doesn’t want to put that out, no matter how many times you’d go see it.”
“The DVD sales, though…”
“Astronomical,” Arne agreed.
“One for every room in the house.” Philipp chalked his cue leisurely as he surveyed the table. He always had these sorts of conversations with Arne, ones that didn’t relate to anything but television or movies or other ephemeral nonsense. Arne worked for the label and Philipp didn’t want to let him know about anything that had to do with the work he did with Bastian. The less the label knew, Philipp had found, the better. Which meant he had to come up with something besides his job to talk about, and somehow, half the time that meant Jason Statham movies. He wasn’t sure if that was Arne’s doing or his.
“And Christmas gifts.”
Philipp laughed at that, nearly dropping his cue. “Can you imagine? Merry Christmas, Mom, it’s that gay Jason Statham movie you always wanted…”
“I didn’t mean for your mom.” Arne snorted and shook his head. “Don’t you have other people to give presents to?”
“Well, I’m assuming you’d already have it, of course, and Andreas probably would as well…”
“How is Andreas, by the way?”
“Moving to Berlin.” Philipp made a face and finally sunk the 6-ball that had been bothering him. “At the end of the month.”
“Wow.” Arne looked somewhat surprised. “Sudden.”
“Not really.” Philipp shrugged and huffed as he missed the next shot. It had been nearly perfect, too. “I knew he had an interview with a design firm up there, and it was pretty much ‘yeah, we want you, see you in two weeks’ after that.”
“Does he have a place to live?” Arne surveyed the table, but flicked his eyes back up to Philipp as he spoke.
“He’s staying with a friend of ours at first.” Philipp leaned on his cue, trying not to laugh at the thought of Andreas and Christian in the same apartment. It was mean of him, and Andreas didn’t deserve that. “And if they don’t kill each other, he’ll find his own place.”
“Some friend.” Arne smoothly knocked the ball into the side pocket. Philipp was still winning, but it was getting close.
“Andreas says he’s gotten better.” Philipp frowned, thinking about Christian. He didn’t like that he had no idea whether Andreas was right or not. He hadn’t talked to Christian in a long time. He’d lost contact with so many people from his pre-management life. It wasn’t that he particularly missed Christian, who he’d always been suspicious of, but it was that Andreas still knew him, was still in touch with all the people that had faded out of Philipp’s life as his career had taken hold.
“Not convinced?”
“I don’t know.” Philipp took his place at the table. “Andreas is probably right. Besides, I’m sure he’ll find a place of his own quickly enough.”
* * * * *
Manuel was actually on time, which was another addition to his “pro” column, not that he needed it now. Philipp already knew that he did fantastic things with the bass, that Arjen was already excited to work with him, and that he already got along well with Bastian and the rest. He was more expensive than Hans-Jörg, but Philipp was of the opinion that Bastian needed to have the best around him.
“Manuel. Welcome.” Philipp smiled and shook his hand. The bassist was wearing an odd sort of cardigan that Philipp was sure was fashionable. It was nothing that Philipp himself would ever wear, which was always the way to tell. “Did you find everything okay?”
“Yes, your directions were very detailed.”
“Good. Good.” Philipp beamed at the compliment, leading Manuel into the studio proper. It was one of the older studios in Munich. Arjen liked to boast that Giorgio Moroder had recorded there. Whether that was true or not, Philipp had no idea, but it was nice to believe. “Let me introduce you around. Of course, you know Mario.”
“Manu!” Mario put his coffee down and unfolded his long legs, standing and kissing Manuel on his cheek and ruffling his hair affectionately. “You made it. I hope Philipp isn’t scaring you off already.”
“No, he’s been very nice. Very helpful.” Manuel beamed at Mario brightly. “Your hair looks great!”
Philipp watched them chat with a certain interest. He knew that Manuel and Mario had been friends, their world was fairly small, but he hadn’t realized they were so close. It was good, but worth keeping an eye on anyway. Mario and Bastian had a dynamic that Philipp didn’t want to disturb. Band chemistry was a difficult thing to get right. “Shall we continue?”
Manuel turned back to him with a bright grin. “Yeah! I want to meet everyone.”
Philipp shot down Mario’s snicker with a glare. He didn’t want to drive Manuel’s enthusiasm out of him on the first day. “Bastian and Arjen should-“
“Hi Mom!” Thomas bounced through the room, ruffling Philipp’s hair and getting smacked away by Mario before he could do the same to him.
“Thomas. You’re late.” Philipp attempted to press his hair back down.
“Yeah, but less late.” Thomas beamed with absolutely no remorse. “Hi! You’re Manuel, yeah? I’m Thomas.”
“Hi.” Manuel shook Thomas’ offered hand, not looking too startled by his arrival.
“Great to have you. Mom, I’m getting a Coke, be in in a sec!” Thomas bounded off towards the kitchen.
“Mom?” Manuel asked, doing a remarkable job in holding back his laughter.
“Oh yeah, we call him that. He hates it.” Mario slung his arm companionably around Manuel’s shoulders.
Philipp sighed long-sufferingly. “Anyway, the recording rooms are this way.”
Arjen and Bastian were discussing something animatedly when the group walked into the control room, but it didn’t sound angry. Small mercies, Philipp supposed. “Arjen? Bastian? Manuel is here.”
“Manu!” Bastian smiled his best pop-star smile and shook the bassist’s hand. “Glad you’re here.”
“Glad to be here.”
“Hope you don’t mind that we throw you right into it, but Arjen has this idea for the bass line on the song we’re working on, and he’s kind of insistent about it…”
“I just want to hear it properly.” Arjen, a Dutch man in flashy clothes whose baldness made him look years older than he was, stepped out of the control room with a somewhat pissy glare to Bastian. “And I hear you’re good. Hi.”
“Hello.” Manuel waved a bit to Arjen.
“He’s great. C’mon, he’ll show you.” Bastian flashed a grin at Philipp before leading Manuel to the instrument rooms.
That had gone easier than Philipp was anticipating, and he knew he shouldn’t be shocked by Bastian listening to him, but it still felt like a novelty. He let the musicians go and returned to the lounge, pulling out his Blackberry as he sat down. Alaba had sent over the revised schedule for Badstuber’s photo shoot. Philipp had resisted getting an assistant, but Bastian had refused to lend his support to the Badstuber project if he didn’t get one. Launching Holger Badstuber as a pop star relied on Bastian’s support, both publically and not, and so he’d relented.
He hated to admit it but he was glad that he had. David Alaba was an eager young Austrian with good organizational skills and boundless energy. His routing and re-routing of emails alone made Philipp’s life much less stressful. Having David also made him seem more professional, he’d found. That he could tell people to send things to his assistant made them take him more seriously. Appearances mattered in this business.
He tapped out a response, then called up his calendar app to make tweaks. It would be a busy few months, and Philipp was itching with the chance to prove himself again.
* * * * *
“It doesn’t seem like that much, in here.”
Philipp shrugged and looked at the pile of boxes and disassembled furniture now taking up a corner of his basement. “It’s because I haven’t got around to putting anything else in here,” he said with a sigh. “I had such plans…”
“Well, I’m glad you haven’t gotten to them yet.” Andreas grinned. “Thank you again, by the way.”
“No problem.” Philipp smiled back at Andreas, feeling oddly melancholy. “I mean, I’ve got the room, right?”
“What are you going to put in here?”
“The pool table.” Philipp wrinkled his nose, gazing at the corner where he had been planning to put it, when he bought it. “And I actually wanted a bar down here, you know? Put some taps in, maybe. I saw something like that in a movie once.”
“Oh, that’d be nice!” Andreas enthused, patting one of the boxes fondly. “Put in a good television, a sound system…worth coming back from Berlin for.”
“And the Wii.” Philipp signed heavily and turned to go up the stairs. It would have been great, but he’d been far too busy to do something like that. He wasn’t sure who he’d have over, after all, with Andreas leaving. It was hard to picture Bastian or Mario playing pool in anyone’s basement, much less his.
“Yeah! Lots of room.”
Philipp padded into the kitchen and started the water boiler. “I have nothing but room all over.”
“So if I come running home, you’ll put me up?” Andreas slid into a stool and propped his chin up on his hands.
“Of course. But you won’t.” Philipp leaned on the counter, one ear focused on the drip of the machine. “You’ll be fantastic. Berlin won’t know what hit it.”
“I hope so. It’s just kind of weird, you know? Really leaving.”
“Yeah.” Philipp looked at his hands, feeling somewhat lost. “So you really don’t want to come back someday?”
“You never know.” Andreas shrugged. “But, I’m not planning it, you know? I’m going to make my life there, hopefully.”
Philipp poured the water over the tea bags, passing Andreas’ mug over to him to prepare. He never got the milk ratio right. “I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too. But it’s just Berlin. And you go up there pretty often, don’t you?”
“Once a month, maybe?” Philipp didn’t particularly like Berlin, but he did have to go for business. He liked Hamburg better. He loved Munich, his home.
“We’ll have lunch or beer or something, then.”
“Yeah,” Philipp replied, something twisting in him a little. He didn’t want Andreas to disappear, too. “Yeah, definitely.”