Thinking with the stories of a student who won't let me go, this article rereads "Da'uud's" participation in an elementary classroom theatre performance alongside my own resistance to conventional qualitative research methods. It is thus about resisting, restorying, and restoring research. In one thread, I trace stories of Da'uud resisting school, school resisting Da'uud, and the brilliance of Da'uud's word play in resisting oppression locally (how he was positioned in the classroom and theatre performance) and globally (e.g. school norms based in white supremacy). In another, I work through (re-read) my fears about research that is too boring, appropriating, or damage-centered, exploring how contexts, time, and my reading of scholarship and theory (especially that which considers axiology) reframe this narrative, restoring joy in research. With Da'uud as the theorist in this exploration, I argue for relational research ethics lived in contingent collaboration.