Of Pisco and Peru: Mancora

Mancora: Pt. 2

Footfalls advance from behind the door, then stop. The sounds of heavy locks and levers releasing. Auntie M glances at me, uncertain. I raise my eyebrows and sigh at the empty air where our ride to freedom was parked not even a minute ago. No escape.

The right door swings inward, revealing a thin, stern-faced Peruvian kid with black, curly hair, maybe just out of his teens. He greets us in Spanish. His name is Molero, the caretaker here.

Our luggage wheels slap against cobblestone as Molero leads us to our rooms.

Taking it in, the place looks better than I imagined, although the compound wall ends, giving way to the shelter of banana trees only thirty feet past the big double-door entrance. Not-so-nice security.

Photo by M Rishal on Unsplash

It’s a cloudless day and there’s a big, inviting pool with a jacuzzi and a large thatched-roof outside bar. No people. Auntie M stops and smiles back at me, pointing to a lonely row of lounge chairs plopped on the sand facing the ocean.

After chipping a sandal on the stone path, I catch up to Auntie M playing with her phone on the front patio between the two middle rooms of a fourplex-style compound. With a heaving grunt, I hoist my overpacked bags up the steps and wipe my brow. “Whew. Man, this place is dead. Where’s Molero?”

The corners of Auntie M’s red lips raise mischievously with an affected English accent. “You are going to loves this, Mist-ah Dougito. There es no keys at this establish-ah-ment.”

I feel the folds of my forehead scrunching against the rim of my glasses when I frown.

Auntie M keeps up the facade like she’s the queen of jolly old England. “Mist-ah Dougito, accordings to my eh-source-es, the owner of this fined establish-a-ment, he got, uh, a wee bit eh-smashed at a party last night after making a fights with her girlfriend.”

I turn away, chuckling under my breath. “His girlfriend.”

She steps forward to get back in my face, “His girlfriend. And that is when eh-she, in a piqu-ed of fury, throws all the keys of this fine establish-a-ment onto the ocean.”

Photo by Nerene Grobler on Unsplash

Molero pops out of the door, startling me. I lock eyes with Auntie M. “What, so we’re on the honor system, now?”

“The locks no work here. And even if they did, the back doors es chiquito with open eh-space at the top. Anyone only has to climb over, anyhows,” she says in her regular voice.

Her face is beaming, full of herself. She reverts back to Queen Elizabeth. “Mist-ah Dougito, what are you afraid of? Someone. . . eh-scrof’u’lous?”

She laughs maniacally as she picks up her travel purse. Molero rips the lighter bag from my hands while I ponder. “Eh-scrofulous?” Great. Now I’m going to have to look up words she uses in English, too.