Vieques Misadventures II

It’s a ten-minute drive from Vieques to Isabel Segundo and the airport on the other side of the island. We have to be at the airport at 9:20, so we tried to start the car at 8:50. The engine refused to turn. I called Martineau’s Car Rental and they said we got the key wet, which is a $350 charge.

“But we didn’t get the key wet! The car was overheating yesterday! And now we are going to miss our flight, I should charge you for the inconvenience! If we got the key wet how could we have the car here at the hotel. You have to send someone here to take us to the airport.” Imagine tortured Spanish here.

I walked across the street and kicked the Malécon. I so rarely get that angry my friends would be surprised to read that. Because the passenger ferry to the main island was out of commission, the car ferries were all running an hour late, and this was why we were even flying to San Juan. Missing the baby flight to San Juan meant missing our flight to Atlanta, and then missing our the last flight out to New York. And that meant missing a meeting for me the next day and possibly our flight to Aspen for a job the next evening. The price of the car rental had just gone from $150 to something like $2000.

Martineau continued, “You got the key wet, it’s the only reason it won’t start. And we have to send the car to the mainland and this is very expensive, we can’t rent it for a month. You agreed to pay $350 if you got it wet.”

“But we didn’t get it wet!”

“Fine take it up with your credit card company. We will send them the evidence.” The could send a picture of any wet key they wanted to send. I told Kevin that if Citibank didn’t side with us he should drop their card but I don’t think he wanted to hear that. Martineau slapped $550 – unauthorized – onto the card immediately, as Kevin was on the phone in the airport lobby frantically making his case to Citibank’s representative.

I do not know if I would call Martineau overtly fraudulent so much as opportunistic. To pass along hearsay, a man who worked for a tour company in Vieques told me that Martineau’s were the worst and often tried to charge people for “getting their keys wet.” Their car repair undoubtedly is expensive but it’s not our fault that the engine couldn’t cool.

We made it to the airport. We made it to Aspen even, only to find a place far more degenerate than I would have imagined.