I fumbled for a key as I neared our door, only to be stopped in my tracks. What the hell was that racket? All I could hear was a resounding chorus of ‘Livin On A Prayer’, and it was coming from inside our apartment.
With still-shaking hands, I opened the door and was confronted by the most ludicrous sight. Three men in sombreros were singing at the top of their voices, another was playing an ancient guitar and yet another was fast asleep with a pyramid of beer cans on his belly and his socks hanging out of his ears. In the middle of this melee was Jess, red curls now expanded by the humidity to the size of a sun lounger, beer can in hand, shouting, ‘Girls, I was starting to get worried about you. Come in and meet the lads.’
I was struck dumb and rooted to the spot. I struggled to construct a sentence, but somehow nothing seemed to articulate the forty-seven different emotions that were coursing through my brain. Carol stepped in.
‘What the fuck is going on, Jess?’ Succinct, but it was better than I could manage.
Four men looked at us in anticipation. The sleeping beer holder never stirred.
‘I met them outside the Scotsman,’ she gushed, having the decency to look mildly ashamed. ‘They’re from Barnsley, and they’ve got nowhere to stay because they got kicked off their campsite. I felt sorry for them and brought them back here. I said they could stay with us. It’s okay, isn’t it?’ she pleaded.
I was still struggling to regain my power of speech.
Kate sighed loudly. ‘Sorry, Jess, but we’ve got rules in this apartment,’ she said forcibly. ‘No men allowed.’
Jess’s face had a look of sheer horror and she was just about to embark on her full Petrocelli mitigation speech when she noticed a smile flickering across Kate’s lips. Carol’s shoulders started to shake and within seconds we were collapsed in a cacophony of laughter and relief. We even woke up Sock Man.
We stayed up until dawn, drinking and exhausting our repertoire of chart hits from the previous decade. At 6 a.m., we concluded with a rousing rendition of ‘A Kind Of Magic’, before slumping to sleep where we sat. We’d already given up on the idea of allocating beds (ten people in a flat designed for two just doesn’t work) and decided that wherever we could clear a floor space, that’s where we would sleep. I can’t remember who, but at some point, someone butchered Paul Young’s hit and the song of the night became Wherever I Lay My Arse, That’s My Home.
The Barnsley guys, we surmised in our drunken state, were both harmless and entertaining. Dave was the guitar player, 5’8”, with a cute grin and a wicked line in jokes. Brian and Barry were brothers, who spoke in synchronisation – one brain with extra arms and legs. Ritchie was the heart-throb – tall, dark and devilishly handsome, with a body that had seen one or two dumb-bells in its time. And as for Sock Man, he didn’t so much as open his eyes all night so we decided that from then on he would officially be called, well, Sock Man.
The first three days were pretty much a repetition of the first, only with more participants. The guys assumed brotherly roles, getting us drinks at the beach and warding off any unwanted advances by claiming to be brothers/boyfriends/husbands depending on the situation. Carol, however, decided that she wanted to get intimate with Ritchie’s abdominals, so they alone embarked on a bit of incest, but that apart it was all very platonic. On day four, everything changed.
It started fairly inauspiciously with a long lazy day at the beach, lots of Ambre Solaire, and the odd game of beach volleyball between visits to the bar for cocktails. We returned to the apartment at six, to prepare for yet another night in Benidorm’s high spots. And when I say high spots, I mean anywhere that sold alcohol and had music that was louder than Concorde. We had developed a very efficient rota system for the bathroom. The boys would go first, and while they were showering, we would have a happy hour on the balcony. When they were done, they would clear out to the pub, leaving us to get ready and meet them later. All very civilised, if it were not for the inevitable clutter, water fights and general mayhem which inevitably ensued.
Unusually, I showered, dressed and made-up fairly quickly that night, having come to the conclusion that it was too hot to fart around and it wouldn’t matter if you had a face like a sunburned arse, in this town you were still guaranteed male attention.
By the time we reached the Scotsman, the guys were on a table singing ‘High Ho Silver Lining’, so we took the opportunity to steal their seats. A bad move as they proceeded to sit on our knees until cramp forced us to dump them unceremoniously on the floor.
At around eleven o’clock, I was feeling decidedly shaky on my stilettos when a tall blond guy walked in, followed by a dark-haired bloke. The blond shouted a greeting to Sarah. I vaguely remembered him as Graham, the guy that she’d been fraternising with the night before, after his great line in chat won over both Sarah and the approval of our self-appointed Barnsley bodyguards. He made his way over to our table, while his friend fought his way to the bar. Through the crowd, I could just make out the top of his head as he waited to be served.
Graham took up position on
