New York City, September 8, 2015

★ The heat hurt a little, out in the full sun. A FedEx truck pulled up to double-park outside the Apple Store, blocking the view of oncoming taxis on Broadway, so it took a sweaty sprint to catch up with an open one a block later. The three-year-old paused on 57th Street to admire the crisply lit cranes of Billionaires Row as they worked toward consuming the blue sky behind them. A man tripped over a pigeon and shook out his leg in disgust or surprise. Someone leaned unceasingly on the horn in the clogged traffic on Columbus Circle, with other horns adding individual short honks to the droning note of fixed rage. The subway stairs were an exhaling windpipe. By late day the air was moving a little, but heavily. In the little encampment or lounge under the scaffold north of the apartment building, where people hung out all day, a woman reclined on a bench and fanned herself with a folding fan.