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It's a glistening early summer morning. The city is in its fourth day of a stifling heat wave, no sign of relief for quite some time. It's 6:40 a.m. One more hit of the snooze button takes Mariam to 6:51 a.m. Her husband, home late after a double shift driving his taxi, is snoring loudly, his arms spread wide across the double bed.

Mariam raises her tired body slowly, yawning and stretching out her limbs. Her thick thighs rub against each other as she pushes her heavy mass off the mattress. Her mind starts racing as she thinks of all she has to do today, most importantly spending her first full day in the kitchen of the new Roti Palace on Warden. For the past year she's just been called in to help out occasionally, but with the opening of a second restaurant Lokesh has agreed to try her out for a week to see if she can cope with the lunch and dinner buffet rushes.

Mariam rounds the corner from the bedroom into the tiny bathroom, hops in the shower and quickly washes. After drying herself off, she puts on the uniform Lokesh's wife Deepti gave her last week and winds her long black hair up tightly into a braid. She then bangs on her son's door as she heads to the kitchen. "School time, boy. Get up," she shouts to him and then disappears into the kitchen to start breakfast. "And wake up yuh sissy, Tariq. She have to go to de daycare. Mrs. Mirello cyan' tek she today."

Tariq is already awake, carefully placing his basketball uniform into his schoolbag. Today is the last game of the year. They're playing against Sir John A. Junior High, the team with the most wins this year. He runs to the bathroom to get himself ready and then plops himself down at the kitchen table while his mother distractedly places a box of no-name Cheerios in front of him and an empty carton of milk.

"Mom, what's wrong with you?" he asks, lifting himself out of the chair and fetching himself a full carton of milk from the fridge.

"Boy, me too busy today. Jus' eat yuh breakfuss and hurry up."

"You're always busy."

"Is true. Me know. But if ah get dis restaurant job, it goin' ease tings up. And Daddy can tek dem course he have to do to start up engineering again. Den he goin' get a good job."

"Whatever, Mom. What about my game today? Is Daddy coming?"

"He got fuh wuk. Yuh know dat."

"Yeah, but when Abba left, you said Daddy would come to my games."

"Tariq, ah doan have time fuh waste yuh know. Is where yuh sissy?"

"How should I know?"

Mariam stomps out of the kitchen to find Yasmin. She's standing on the plastic stool in the bathroom trying to brush her teeth. "Come on, Yaaz. We got to hurry." Mariam helps her to finish brushing and then drags her to the kitchen. "Tariq, pour out some cereal fuh yuh sissy, nuh."

"I'm tired," yawns Yasmin.

"You can sleep in de car, Yaaz. Mommy got to drop off yuh bruddah and dis application before we go to de daycare okay?"

Yasmin nods and smiles as she attempts to put too large a spoonful of cereal into her tiny mouth.

"Can you come to my game then?" moans Tariq.

"Me got fuh wuk, Tariq."

"You're always working. And Daddy's always working. It's not fair!"

"Yuh right, boy. But what we can do?" Mariam finishes her own bowl of cereal and then snatches Tariq and Yasmin's bowls out from under them and plunks them in the sink.

"Okay, hurry, Tariq, and help yuh sissy get ready. I got to finish writing dis ting."

"But, Mom-"

"Tariq!"

Tariq slumps off to the room he shares with his sister, Yasmin in tow.

Mariam pulls her husband's college application out of a kitchen drawer and starts filling in the appropriate boxes. They can't afford for him to attend college if she isn't working full-time. So everything is riding on today's performance. Once completed, Mariam places the application into an envelope, which she stuffs into her purse, and then she starts making Tariq's lunch.

"We're done!" screams Tariq, as he yanks Yasmin into the kitchen, all pretty in a pink dress bought from Value Village.

"All right, all right. Jus' wait lil' bit more," sighs Mariam. Tariq disappears into the living room, turns on the TV and starts watching the sports channel. Yasmin climbs up onto the couch, sticks her thumb in her mouth and closes her eyes. She hates going to daycare. Mrs. Mirello is much nicer than any of the teachers at daycare. And Mrs. Mirello never remembers if she's given her dessert or not, so she always gets seconds. "We goin'to be late, we goin' to be late," Mariam screams out as she dashes into the living room and turns off the TV, handing Tariq the lunch bag. "Leh we go, nuh." Mariam puts her purse over her shoulder and grabs Yasmin's bag which she packed the night before. She then picks up Yasmin who is already sleeping. "Come, nuh, lil' gyirl. Time to go." It's now 7:40. She's supposed to be at the restaurant by 9:00 at the latest to start preparations. She locks the door behind her and rushes to the elevator, passing Mrs. Mirello's door where she would normally have dropped off Yasmin.

"Please open, please open," she begs, anticipating the worst. Her prayers are answered, for within twenty seconds the door to an empty elevator opens. She steps in, holding Yasmin who wakes in all the excitement, and Tariq follows them both in and plops his schoolbag on the floor.

"How come you and Daddy don't do any of the prayers like Abba used to do?"

"We too busy. Yuh see fuh yuhself. We doan' have de time."

"But isn't that, like, against Allah or something? Abba never looked too pleased with you."

"Yeah, well, me faddah din' have to run here and run dere, doing everything."

Reaching the ground floor, Mariam rushes out of the elevator and heads for the back door of the building that leads to the parking lot. She passes Mrs. Poon and Mr. Ramraj on the way, smiling at them and calling out a loud "Morning." She finds her car parked next to her husband's taxi. She opens the doors, placing Yasmin in the car seat in the back while Tariq climbs in over the driver's seat and buckles himself into the front passenger seat, whining about the heat. Mariam straps her daughter in safely and kisses her on the nose just as Yasmin's eyes flutter closed again and her head tips to the side.

Mariam stuffs Yasmin's bag into the back seat, locks the back door and slams it shut. She then settles herself into the driver's seat and begins her second set of morning prayers. "Please start, please start," she pleads with the car while turning the key. Tariq giggles a little, looking over at his mother's frantic face, and then starts praying with her, realizing that if the car doesn't start he may never make it to school and he might miss his game. When the engine finally does roll over, Mariam and Tariq cheer and thank Allah, laughing together. "All right, leh we go now," Mariam roars definitively as she backs out of the parking spot and heads for the main road.

Luckily for Mariam the daycare she uses whenever Mrs. Mirello needs a day off is just a block away from the new Roti Palace. The order of the day is to drop her husband's application off first at the college. There's no delaying that because today is the deadline. Then she'll drop Tariq off at school, Yasmin off at daycare, and she should have plenty of time to get to the restaurant.

Tariq turns on the radio as Mariam makes a difficult left onto Brimley.

"Tariq!"

"Mom, you should listen to the news, just in case there's, like, an accident or something."

"Boy, jus' turn it down, yuh hear?"

"Fine. I thought you were going to get air conditioning in here. You know, Danny's mother has air conditioner in her car. They even have it in their house!"

"Open yuh window, Tariq, and stop complaining."

Driving north along Brimley Mariam sighs audibly appreciating the fact that visiting Abba is no longer part of the morning routine. She misses her father and has even forgiven him for buying his plane ticket home without even telling her, but she is grateful for the extra time she now has.

"You think Abba likes it back in Guyana?" asks Tariq as if he was reading her mind.

"Yuh talk to him every week. What yuh think?"

"I think he does. He's got Aunty Napha and Aunty Salma there. Maybe we could go visit him. I could meet my cousins you're always going on about. Maybe this summer we could go? Can we? Can we? It's not like I'm going to camp."

"If we cyan' pay fuh camp, yuh tink we can pay for a trip to Guyana?"

"Can't pay, can't pay, can't pay. That's, like, the only words that ever come out of your mouth."

"Tariq -"

"Whatever."

Mariam eyes her son furtively as he looks out of his window. His lips are pursed tightly, and he twists his fingers together as if he wants to break them. With the extra money from the full-time job, provided she gets it, she promises herself to send Tariq to camp. He'll miss the first session, but he'll have all of July to look forward to the August session.

A right turn onto Ellesmere, a few lane changes while the newscaster spits out baseball scores, and they speedily arrive at Centennial College, Scarborough campus. Mariam leaves Tariq in charge of the illegally parked car, runs inside and finds the admissions office where she happily hands over the application. Retracing her steps, Mariam jogs back to the car, pleased to find it still there, her son now listening to rock music. She hops in and zips off in the direction of Tariq's school.

"So, Mom?"

"Yeah?"

"What happens if you don't get the job?"

"What? You doan' tink ah goin' to get it?"

"No, Mom. Of course you'll get it. You make the best roti in the entire world."

Mariam smiles at her son.

"But you never know with these things, right? I mean, Sir John A. is pretty good, right? But we could easily beat them today. We came pretty close last time: 46 to 32."

Mariam is amazed at her son's insight. She pats his head, grinning at him in a way that embarrasses him.

"Mom!"

"Is true, boy," she says proudly. "Is true, true. We can never know wha' goin' to happen."

This thought sets Mariam's mind racing. Her and her husband immigrated nine years ago, when Tariq was four. Yasmin, just three years ago, was a joyful surprise. But now, after nine tiring years, she wonders if things have improved. They have a bigger apartment, two cars and enough money to go to a movie once a month, but they spend all their time working. Maybe her father was right, Mariam thinks, looking over at her son who's singing along to some loud obnoxious song. "Ah din' come to Canada to be a bad moddah," she whispers to herself as she makes a left down Aylmer.

Mariam exhales loudly, checking the clock as she pulls into the semicircle driveway of Aylmer Junior High.

"Good luck, Tariq. Daddy and I gon pray that yuh win."

"Thanks, Mom," Tariq says as he winds up his window and hops out of the car, swinging his schoolbag across his shoulder. "Oh, and good luck at the restaurant."

Mariam looks out at her son. "If you win de game an' I get de job, we can celebrate wit' Daddy tonight."

"It's a deal," Tariq screams as he runs up the stairs that lead into the school.

"Okay. Now, pay attention, Mariam," she tells herself, as she pulls out of the driveway. She heads down Aylmer with a determined spirit. She won't let her children pay for her and her husband's difficulties anymore. She turns right onto Kennedy and glides along smoothly thinking about how to keep her cool when things get hectic at the restaurant. Lokesh told her the secret is never to get behind. "Doan' get behind," she says out loud, like she's reciting a mantra. "Doan' get behind."

A quick left turn onto Ellesmere off McCowan and Mariam drives straight into a traffic jam. "Shit," she squeals and curses Tariq for changing the radio station. She finds the news station and listens intently for the traffic update. Sure enough there's an accident at Ellesmere and Brimley, where she just was a few minutes ago. "Dammit," she says out loud, for there were so many other routes she could have taken to get over to Warden. She checks the clock: 8:19. "Doan' worry', doan' worry'," she tells herself. "Ah got plenty more time."

Her car not having moved in over five minutes, Mariam waits for an opening in the oncoming traffic and then makes a U-turn and zips off in the opposite direction. With a lot of other cars using the same diverted route, the drive is rather slow. But at least it's moving, she tells herself, as she feels her body temperature rise. Not only is the car blazing in the summer heat, but Mariam's pulse is racing. Imagine being late for her first full day. "Shit, shit, shit!" she screams out, pounding the steering wheel and pursing her lips. Back down McCowan and an eventual right turn onto Lawrence. It's 8:40 now, and it's a long stretch westward. Mariam swerves in and out of lanes expertly, gripping the steering wheel tightly and focussing eagerly on her destination. "Come on, come on, come on," she yells as she honks at someone who's driving the speed limit.

Ten minutes later Mariam reaches Warden and makes an easy right turn. Luckily, the road seems rather clear, for everyone else is going southbound. Mariam thanks Allah, the way her father always does when things go right, and she speeds away, praying that no policemen are watching her. She navigates her way well, bypassing slow buses and whizzing through amber lights.

In record time, Mariam reaches the entrance to the Roti Palace at 8:56. "Perfect," she says to herself, smiling and breathing out deeply. She turns into the large lot, rolling up her window tightly, and finds a parking spot just off to the left of the restaurant entrance. "Now, I got to relax and tink only about de job," she tells herself. She wipes the sweat off her face with a tissue she finds in her purse and takes two deep breaths as she exits the car. Walking toward the restaurant she remembers her one goal: don't get behind.

Lokesh greets Mariam pleasantly and wishes her luck after introducing her to Kapil, a cook at the other restaurant who's come to help out and answer any questions. Lokesh will be in the office if she needs him, he informs her. Mariam gets to work quickly, taking control confidently. She prepares everything, making extra dough just in case and ensuring all the other buffet items are ready, most of which Kapil prepared the night before and will slowly train Mariam to do over the next couple of weeks, if she is offered the job. There are a couple other items she needs to make from scratch-the pilouri and the bara-which she does in plenty of time with Kapil's help.

By 11:30, when the lunch crowd arrives, Mariam is on top of things. The roti is going out hot, and she keeps the buffet items topped up: curried lamb, chicken and beef, stew chicken, eggplant bhaji, rice and peas, and dhal. Lokesh comes into the kitchen at one point and congratulates her, telling her she's doing a good job, that the customers are enjoying the food. She imagines how excited Tariq will be when she tells him about camp.

Everything is rolling along extremely well until about 1:30, when sirens interrupt Mariam's work. There's a big commotion outside. A lot of the restaurant patrons rush to the windows to see what's going on. There are two police cars, as well as an ambulance. Mariam can't see from inside the kitchen, but she can hear the fuss. She puts down her rolling pin and heads into the dining room, Kapil right behind her. Everyone looks horrified, expressions of shock on their faces.

"Hope it's not about the restaurant," Lokesh whispers to Mariam, as he heads outside to check it out. Something stirs inside Mariam. She drops her apron and heads for the door. Leaving the cool of the air-conditioned restaurant, the heat hits her like a bomb as she pushes the door open. She heads toward the crowd and approaches slowly, as if someone else is moving her. The air is still and heavy. She finds it hard to go forward, feeling her stomach drop out from under her, but her feet keep moving. As she gets closer to the scene, closer to the crowd that has now formed, she sees that it's her car that is surrounded. She continues on: a little closer, a little closer. Everyone is staring at her car.

"Who could do such a thing?!" Someone yells.

"It's disgusting!" shouts someone else.

"Oh, my Lord!" cries another. "Imagine leaving a child in a hot car like that!"

Mariam's knees buckle.

"Imagine leaving a child to die like that," a woman squeals.

Mariam falls to the ground, her body unable to hold her up any longer.

"It's just criminal!" shouts a man. "Just criminal!"

Mariam kneels on the ground, her legs tucked under her knees. Her flour-covered arms stretch out toward the car, her head dropped into her chest. In her mind she's reaching, reaching for Yasmin who she knows is already gone. Tears envelop her face, streaming down like heavy rain. She can't speak. She can't move. She sits like that for what seems like a long time. And then she hears the sirens stop. She hears the crowd disperse. And she hears heavy footsteps approaching.