“What does ODSP cover?” she whispered, echoing the question she’d asked her new caseworker, David, that morning. He had smiled the thin, bureaucratic smile. “Shelter. Basic needs. Benefits.”
Her son, Leo, age seven, had drawn a picture on the back of an electricity bill. A stick-figure family under a crooked sun. Leo had asked for new running shoes yesterday. His current pair had a grin cut into the side, the sole flapping like a tired tongue. what does odsp cover
It floated.
The coin stopped spinning. She picked it up—a loonie. The last one until next week’s cheque. “What does ODSP cover
Maya thought about what ODSP didn’t cover. It didn’t cover the bus fare to the MS clinic (two zones, $7.50). It didn’t cover the new battery for her wheelchair when the old one groaned up the hill to Leo’s school. It didn’t cover the quiet dread that lived in her chest—the math problem that never solved: $1,255 total. Rent $1,100. Leftover: $155. Food? Hydro? Leo’s feet growing again? Basic needs