It was 97 degrees outside and somehow hotter underground. The 6 train platform at 77th Street felt like the inside of a tandoor.
I stood there fanning myself with a folded ELLE, mascara already surrendering, and I swear the air didn't move. It just sat on us. Heavy, like a wet dupatta.
When the train finally came, the first car had no AC. You could tell by the faces — that specific New York grimace of people who have suffered and are about to suffer more. I got in anyway because I am both impatient and an idiot.
Here is what the 6 train at 77th in a heatwave does to people. It removes the pretense. A man in a suit loosened his tie and openly said "we are going to die" to no one. A teenager offered around a pack of gum like it was communion. An older woman with a paper fan started fanning the baby next to her, then the baby's mother, then me. I almost cried, honestly. Not from the heat.
By 59th Street we were all just glistening comrades. Someone said the next car probably had AC and half of us didn't even move. Too far gone. Solidarity in the sweat.
Back home in Ahmedabad, summer is a fact of life. Forty-five degrees and you just... adapt. You nap through the worst of it, you drink chaas, you don't fight the sun. New York summer is different because nobody prepared us and everybody complains and yet we all keep riding the 6 train at 77th like it owes us something.
I got off at Union Square, walked into the first bodega I saw, and pressed a cold Thums Up-adjacent mango soda to my neck before I even paid. The guy behind the counter just nodded. He understood.
The heat breaks you down until all that's left is kindness and one working brain cell.
Stay hydrated, my sweaty loves.
Love,