There is a specific kind of prayer you say on the 2 train platform at 135th Street in late June. You stand there, already sweating through a linen shirt you ironed for nothing, and you whisper to the gods of the MTA: please, just one cold car.
The AC lottery is real. The doors slide open and you have half a second to read the air. Cold? You lunge in like you've won the green card. Warm and stale? You stand frozen, doing math about whether the next train will be better, knowing it won't.
This morning I lost. Got a car that felt like the inside of a tandoor. A man next to me fanned himself with a folded New York Post. A kid in a stroller had simply given up and gone to sleep, which honestly felt like the wisest move available.
The heatwave this week has flattened everyone. Walking up out of the station at Park Place, the air hit me thick and wet, the way the monsoon used to feel in Ahmedabad right before it broke. Except no rain comes here. Just bodega AC units dripping on your head like a small, unromantic blessing.
I bought a mango lassi from the deli on Greenwich Street, which is not a real lassi, it is mango yogurt drink in a plastic bottle, but the man behind the counter calls me beta now and that is worth more than authenticity.
Here's the thing about the AC lottery. You can't control it. You can only show up at the platform, hope, and accept whatever car the universe gives you. Some days you sweat. Some days you shiver. There is a metaphor in there but it is too hot to chase it.
By evening the cars cooled down and I got a good one, almost empty, the kind of train that makes you feel like the city loves you back for ten whole stops.
Win some, sweat some.
Love,