to be short (tight?) or scarce (see Molina, who gives the example in the first person singular)
Orthographic Variants:
atle niquixcaua
Alonso de Molina:
atle niquixcaua. (pret. atle oniquixcauh.) ser apretado o escasso. Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 8v. col. 2. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.