There are few moments in my life where I have felt small.

I mean, there’s the obvious times like when I called my teacher “mom” in tenth grade and my table partner spent the rest of the period mocking me or when I got to school one October morning only to realize there was a sock static-clinging to the inside of my hoodie. But there are also the quieter moments like when I’m telling a customer their total and it’s $9.11 and I round to .10. Or when the topic is genocide and the teacher makes an effort to avoid eye contact with me aiming for casual but being anything but as she skips over my hijab-clad head in the rotation.

There are very few moments in my life where I have felt small. But the smallest I ever felt was when a stranger confided in me and I could do nothing more than hold space for him, unable to shoulder any more of the burden than I was already carrying for myself. The smallest I ever felt was when I wasn’t able to use my in-between to create ease for another.

*****

On March 13, 2026 I was at work, waiting patiently for the last hour of my shift to pass, the clock ticking agonizingly slowly. I could almost hear it taunting me “I’m in control. You go home when I say you do”. It was 9pm and the Ramadan exhaustion was hitting, okay? I swear I’m not crazy.

At this point in the shift there are about three team members plus the baker. It's slow, everyone looking for ways to keep busy, the fear of being caught idle by the cameras enough to maintain momentum.

From my peripheral, as I am stocking lids for what felt like the hundredth time in seven hours, I saw the front doors open. I didn’t immediately rush to the front, knowing from experience that the people coming in at this time of night either needed to pee and were going to slip out the side door afterwards or needed a minute to situate themselves.

I help a few cars in the drive-through and then make my way to the front where the guy at the counter is staring at the digital menu display like the answers to the universe were laced in the contents. If the calorie count of an Iced Cap could provide me with the answers to my upcoming psychology exam, I’d down them like shots.

“Hi there! What can I get for you?” I ask, fighting back a yawn. So off topic, but I wonder how many times I say these words in a year. I’m guessing somewhere in the realm of hundreds of thousands.

“Where are all the Indians?"

So you want a cappuccino served with a side of politics and disappointment.

I knew he was referring to other Indigenous people, as he himself had some tattoos on his temple which I’ve come to learn are a part of some Indigenous communities' cultures. I won’t lie, for about 0.2 seconds there, I thought he was talking about people from India. Four hours of sleep and adhd are a hell of a cocktail.

I’ve been asked this question before. Working at this Tim Hortons located on the Tsuut'ina reserve your place was bound to be questioned as a hijabi with a Palestine-shaped necklace around and hijab on your head.

I never know how to answer it.

If I tell the truth, I am letting the White Man win. In admitting his sins, I am praising the devil, acknowledging that he willed and so therefore he did.

If I lie, I am fueling false hope.

For a people stuck in constant survival, that is worse than the admittance of any sin.

“We have one Indigenous girl. She works in the morning though, so she’s not here.” Behind the counter my fingers are tapping on the counter, a soundtrack to the absolute exhaustion that passes on his face.

“Just one? On the reserve and you just have ONE Indian?” He asks, his paint covered hands coming to rest on the counter. Laced together formally like we were in a courtroom and not a restaurant.

I don’t know what to say.

I know how empty the words “sorry” feel when in the space between the letters there are graves. That the pen that authored them was laced with blood.

“You don’t think that’s crazy?”

Usually I stay silent for fear of what would happen if I spoke out against my management and their hiring practices. I remember coming home after my first day of work, cheeks flushed with the exertion of doing something and an ache in my knees. I remember gushing about how the freedom had felt but also wanting to quit because it was hard and some of my coworkers were mean. What I remember most, however, was saying how despite being on the reserve, I had yet to meet an Indigenous coworker. At 16, I identified the pattern, gave it a name, having seen it in my own life, in my own communities. Yet, surrounded by other foreigners and immigrants I could find no sympathy. It was business as usual except what business did we have staying silent for $15 an hour? I always thought silence was more expensive than that.

But on this particular evening, I was feeling bold.

“I do.” I liked the way the words tasted on my tongue, how they pushed past my lips.

“My people suffer from poverty because nobody hires us, even on our own fucking reserve.”

“I get what you’re saying,” I said, glancing behind me to make sure the others on shift were tucked away in the back.

“I want to talk to the managers. Are they in?”

“They work weekday mornings. They usually leave around noon.”

“I’ll come by. This is so frustrating.”

“You know there should be laws that say that on the reserve, managers have to hire 80% Indigenous employees and 20% other employees.”

“We believe that we are not the owners of this land. Instead, it is a gift from our Creator and we are obligated to share it with others. The animals, the trees, other races and cultures. We have to be equal, so it’d have to be a 50-50 split.”

“But,” I trailed off, realizing just how absurd it was that we had one Indigenous employee. Out of 50.

That was 2%.

Standing there, wearing the black pants that always make me laugh because they are so ill-fitting and a grey polo that sucked the whimsical nature of my personality right out of my body, I couldn’t help thinking of my own people. Of the thread that was connecting me to this man’s story. Not mine by birthright, but in the echo.

In Palestine, where what you have for you is far below any world standard of living, the need and urge to share with others is overwhelming.

بدي إلك متل ما بدي لحالي.

I want for you like I want for myself.

“I’m Palestinian,” I whispered, wanting to offer him something to hold too.

Growing up, my mother always told my brothers and I that if someone comes to you looking for help, a cup of sugar, or even a smile, you should give them the space to do something back for you. Not because you need it but so that they do not feel embarrassed, or worse, indebted to you.

Once, our neighbour whose husband was buried in student loan debt from med school asked my mom for a cup of sugar because she was baking cookies for her husband to take for his first day of residency and she couldn’t afford to spend $8 on a new bag. The school year was fast approaching and with three kids to clothe and supply, money was tighter than usual. My mom gave her the entire bag of sugar in the pantry and then, a few weeks later when she was going out of town, she asked that very same friend if she could come by and watch my brothers and I for a few hours after school. Not because we were little and needed a babysitter; no, I was a teenager and had been left with my siblings for a night and a day before. No, she did it because she wanted her friend to feel like her equal.

“We stand with you,” he says, his hand coming out to shake mine.

Solidarity.

I know his initial anger and hostility wasn’t at me. It was given to me because the hazel of my kohl lined eyes and the hijab told him I was safe.

That I would hold his sorrows.

Share in his grief.

Maybe even translate it.

“Our deaths weren’t enough for them. You’re gonna see. In the coming months, we’re going to start holding back resources. Then they’ll care. The world will finally have to give a crap about us.”

“So, what can I get for you?” I asked again, catching the camera to my right from the corner of my eye. I’d been idle for too long. But I wasn’t ready to let the conversation end. And in my mundane questions, the letters were rearranging themselves like alphabet soup into the questions into the things we were afraid to say.

“An extra large triple triple.”

“Why are our lives worth less? We all have 206 bones. Two eyes. Ten toes.”

“Anything else?”

“Our liberation is intertwined and our oppressors are stuffing the yarn of our commonality into their pockets, tangling the line.”

“A chocolate dip.”

“I wish I could stop innocent blood from spilling.”

“Your total is 4.39.”

“Somebody’s four year old child died today because of the colour of their skin.”

“It’ll be on that counter there,” I said pointing, after his receipt had populated.

I disappear to the back and make the coffee.

The entire time I can’t shake the conversation.

“I’m sorry for bothering you. I didn’t mean to ruin your day,” he said when I brought back his coffee.

As if you can bother me.

I’ve been bothered since I took my first breath.

Since I started my first day of kindergarten.

Since I graduated high school.

A paradox: both a bother and constantly bothered.

“You didn’t ruin my day. This is our reality.” I said, glancing behind me.

“It’s just that it bothers me that they don’t hire us and then have the audacity to call us lazy, sleazy, no-good Indians.”

“I understand you. I’ve been told more times than I can count to leave the politics at home. But how can we when this is our lived reality?”

We can’t cross the hyphen in our identities like a bridge.

“I hope to see us free in this lifetime. You, me. Black people. They understand our struggles too.”

“They do,” I agree, my attention wavering. Someone was calling my name from the back. The baker I think.

I couldn’t stop thinking about him. After I’d clocked out, eaten my dinner, brushed my teeth, and tucked myself into bed, I was still thinking about him. About the grief that hung to him like a shadow, even in the dark of a crisp winter evening. Of his preference for dirty language and the sour closing note of his laugh, like his joy was permissible but limited, lasting for just as long as it takes for the memories of history to resurface.

And what I remember thinking about the most was how I hadn’t gotten his name.

I wish I had.