The Odd Couple

When our mum died in 1992 our dad did a re-evaluation of his life, he had retired a couple of years earlier and I was paying him a small fortune in monthly payments spread over a time period of “for ever” in repayment for his share of the company – I didn’t see it coming and he set me up good and proper.

He and our mum had made Benidorm a second home over the previous ten years and had many English and Spanish friends out there so he started to take longer and longer holidays, renting apartments from whoever had one to rent and at the same time his old mate Brian started to tag along too, sharing the rent.

Eventually and on the advice of some Spanish businessmen friends who were introduced as members of the “mafiosa” to him – our dad liked that idea and was disappointed later when someone else explained that the word “mafiosa” in Spain usualy means nothing more sinister than the local Rotary Club – anyway, they explained that renting apartments would be much more cost effective than actually buying one, especially the one that they had in mind at the back of the town where all of the Spanish hotel workers lived, it wasn’t what he had in mind, a one bedroomed apartment with a glassed-in balcony at the back of the town but when they told him that the owner only wanted the local taxes paying during the winter season he was suddenly interested – he got the apartment for around £20 a week and Brian stumped up for half of that.

In the words of the Rod Stewart song they “soon became the toast of the great white way” and for seven years the pair of them were well known fixtures in that town where pensioners never sleep, they partied every night, seven nights a week, the apartment was too shabby to stay in and stare at the walls so they didn’t – they spent every night out on the pop performing for the holiday makers, for Brian was a well known club compare and could sing a bit while our dad had had a singing and comedy routine in pubs and clubs for all of his life.

They were such regular fixtures at one particular sing-a-long bar that they had two stools in the corner of the bar and everyone thought that they were the owners, not that they ever denied it of course, the owner was a huge fat Spaniard who was quite happy for two Englishmen to run his bar for him and our dad and Brian would operate the air conditioning, set up the microphones and organise the entertainment for the evening while the real owner just poured beer.

They soon became known as “The Odd Couple” after the film starring Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon, our dad was Lemmon to Brians Matthau, Brian was always getting bollacked for leaving the apartment untidy or coming home late some nights after he’d walked “a lady” back to her hotel, or sometimes not coming home at all after he’d walked “a lady” back to her hotel.

One year when I arrived out there to drive them home for the summer I was told that I could have Brians bed for the night as he wasn’t coming home, he had himself a “fancy woman” and as it was his last night he was sure he’d be “on a promise”.

{late edit} I’ve just remembered a small detail from another visit I made when Brian had himself a “fancy woman”, anyone who remembers the TV comedy “Sgt Bilko” will remember Doberman, the small fat ugly Italian who is Bilko’s fallguy, and those who are particular fans will remember the episode where Bilko organises a dance on the base and Doberman brings his sister – who is actually the actor who played Doberman dressed in drag – yes ? You remember that episode ? Well my dad described Brians “fancy woman” with two simple words that spoke volumes – when I asked he described her as “Dobermans Sister” {back to the real story}

Brian had the glassed in balcony as his bedroom, no heating and no curtains so anyone who cared to glance in the right direction every morning got the full frontal of Brian arising off his camp bed in his vest and underpants and scratching his bollacks for five minutes, I found it strange sleeping out on the balcony that night but awoke early the next morning ready to pack the car and set off on the long drive back to blighty.

In the living room I found Brian asleep on the settee and assuming that he hadn’t “got lucky” that night went to put the kettle on for him – thats when I noticed that he was covered from head to toe in scratches some of which were still bleeding.

He woke up, stared at me staring at him and offered “What a bloody night I’ve had” as explanation, then he told me the story.

He’d taken his rich widow to her hotel and she’d run inside without so much as a peck on the cheek, so Brian set off on the long walk back to the apartment at around 3am in the morning.

I have to explain here that Benidorm is built in the American stylee of North-South, East-West streets dividing the whole town into large blocks of developments – to the back of the town are the Spanish apartment blocks where all the workers live and to the front the first four blocks back from the sea are all tourist hotels – apart from the block right in front of our dad and Brians apartment which had been set aside for development and then never built on – it was why Brian got away with scratching his bollacks on the balcony every morning without being arrested, and with hindsight it was probably Brian scratching his bollacks every morning that dissuaded the developers to build on it.

So there is this huge barren wasteland right behind their apartment block and on the opposite side is where the hotels begin, and that is exactly where Brian found himself at 3am that morning, drunk, and a bit miffed at not even a peck on the cheek, and as he leaned on the wall that surrounded the wasteland he could see his own apartment block over on the other side, 100 yards away.

The only option was to walk around the block because inside it was overgrown with several years worth of brambles, bushes and small trees, but Brian was drunk, it was late, he just wanted his bed, the bed that I had claimed so he just wanted the settee, he didn’t want to walk around, and as he explained several times, he’d driven a tank all over Korea in the 1950’s so 100 yards of wasteland wasn’t going to be much of an obstacle to him, not when he could see his own apartment glowing, beckoning, in the dark.

He climbed over the wall and jumped off into the wasteland, it was only four foot high on the pavement side.

Unfortunately it was at least eight foot high on the other side, I can testify to this as I went to have a look as soon as it was light enough and I nearly wet myself laughing when I saw just how far down Brian had fallen.

He says that he lay there for quite some time thinking about what to do next and wondering where his spectacles had gone, they had gone is the answer, he never found them again, so now he was inside the barren wasteland with an eight foot high encasing him in, and he didn’t have the luxury of being able to spot his own balcony again, it being out of focus now and everything.

He thinks he was in there for at least three hours and he’d only just arrived back in the apartment when I awoke – my laughing as he told the tale of how he had wandered through the jungle of thorns, blind and in darkness for three hours woke my dad up and he sat with a cup of tea and roared with laughter when Brian told the tale all over again – we both got dressed quickly and walked down to the spot where Brian must have made his jump and we stood on that pavement and laughed and laughed while the holidaymakers hurried past on their way to the beach wondering what the hell was so funny inside the city block of thorns.

We were late leaving Benidorm that day – Brian had to go to the market and buy a new pair of spectacles from a man who had a market stall full of second hand pairs, luckily he had Brians exact prescription for just 200 pesetas (about £1 ), they were probably Brians own pair, he was always losing them.