Eternal Spring YA short story collection

The Vanishing Spring by Carey Corp

The Vanishing Spring

By

Carey Corp

The first time Tyler Diaz heard the Legend of the Vanishing Spring, he was sitting on an intricately carved bench overlooking the tiny pond next to the “Members Only” clubhouse, wishing he could disappear.

Face tipped skyward, he let the sun’s first powerful rays of spring banish the chill from his veins. Letting his eyes drift shut, he indulged in a moment of homesickness. The more the earth warmed, the more he would miss La Villita: the heavenly aroma of the taquerías wafting on the breeze, the swirling rainbow of festive colors adorning both shops and shoppers, the soothing cadences of español rolling off a thousand tongues in heated conversation.

Here, no one spoke Spanish, not even in school. Kids studied only the most pretentious romance languages, plus Japanese, and—ugh—Latin. Even everyday conversation was a crazy Stepford blend of stuck-up English, ghetto teen, and French.

“We’re going to La Petite Mais’ for lattes. Wanna come?"

Tyler shook back his dark curls and blinked at the blonde Barbie flanked by her silicone regime. No matter how long he lived among them, he’d never get the kids of Quimby Acres—especially the girls. They seemed to have an endless supply of money to waste on crap—clothes, electronics, and the other various, over-priced accoutrements that accompanied a life of privilege. Often when he stared at their expensive haircuts and European wardrobes, he wondered how they would fare if their families ever fell from grace.

Not that he knew what it was like to be poor. He wasn’t from el barrio, didn’t have cousins with gang affiliation doing time for drive-bys. He came from an average, middle class Mexican-American family. His great grandparents had emigrated from Mexico City before his abuelo had been born. Since then, three generations of Diazes had grown up less than a block apart in Little Village on Chicago’s West Side. Well, almost grown up.

That was all B.C.

Before his papi met Carmen.

Carmen was an overpriced accoutrement, herself. Totally absurd. Ty still couldn’t comprehend how an honorable, hardworking family man like Hector Diaz had fallen under Carmen’s evil spell. She wore eight hundred dollar, bubblegum pink warm-up up suits, worked out like a prison inmate, and treated her ridiculous little chorkie like she’d given birth to him. It—the freakin’ dog—had gone to the Bahamas with Carmen and his dad, riding in the luxury of a handbag that cost more than most people make in a year!

The first thing Carmen had done, as soon as she’d gotten the obscenely large engagement ring onto her French manicured, anorexic finger was to get his papi to sell the lucrative property he owned. Her second nefarious act was moving them out of La Villita to the gated community in Wilmette. The third and most unforgiveable feat was to convince Hector Diaz he owed it to himself to see the world, while his only son—a minor at that—deserved a first rate, private education under the custodial eye of their housekeeper, Helga.

What Carmen had really done was strip the vibrancy from Ty’s life: the colors, smells, cacophony of sounds, and, most importantly, the rich familial relationships. In La Villita, he was an average seventeen-year-old boy surrounded by su comunidad; in Wilmette, he was treated like a two-dimensional Latino Versace model. But even as they appreciated his good looks they still managed to make him feel like a minimum wage pool boy. Which reminded him why he was sitting by the pond trying to shake of his foul mood in the first place—because he’d been mistaken for landscaping staff and ordered to sweep grass clippings up from the communal sidewalk. Which he’d done, much to his humiliation and the confusion of the actual grounds crew. But it was easier than trying to explain. He wondered if there’d ever come a day where that kind of mierda didn’t bother him. Not likely.