Dare to Survive: Based on the true story of a woman conned and imprisoned in South America for drug trafficking by Carolyn V. Hamilton
Lima’s airport security check-point my life changed forever. Dragging the wheeled scuba case across the scarred linoleum, I shifted my backpack on my shoulder and headed for security. There the attendant with a wordless half-smile placed the case and my backpack on the conveyor belt.
I’d arrived early—three hours before my scheduled Aero Mexico flight—and found Lima’s international airport almost empty. My watch read 8:10 p.m. Dom wouldn’t arrive for another half-hour. I’d get the x-ray part of check-in out of the way, find a place to sit in this lifeless, shoebox of an airport, and wait for him and the Aero Mexico desk people to arrive. Darkness outside and the humid October night air made the airport chilly, and my feet in their high-heeled sandals were cold.
Minutes passed. The x-ray guy asked me something in Spanish. All I understood was my name. “Kath-rrreen Prrrentees.” Cathryn Prentis. “No habla Español.”
He rolled over the scuba case. “Scuba?”
“Sì. Scuba tank. There’s no pressure.” I opened the case so he could see for himself.
He removed the tank’s valve and sent the tank back through the x-ray machine without the case.
“Something wrong?”
He didn’t look at me when he answered. “No.”
I figured he didn’t speak much, if any, English. Had he understood my question? Pain from standing so long on high heels burned up my back. I shifted my weight from one foot to the other. A banding ache tightened my arches. Oh, to just sit down in a chair. What had I been thinking when I put on high-heeled sandals? I spotted a nearby row of chairs and tottered towards them.
The Peruvian x-ray attendant exploded in a loud barrage of Spanish. Who was he yelling at? I looked around, saw people staring at me. I stopped, looked back at the x-ray guy. How military he looked in his brown airport uniform.
In broken English he cried, “No move.”