It is a scorching May in Delhi. The air is hot and gritty, a napping dragon’s exhalations. Our bodies have become sweat machines. The leaves of the gulmohar have charred at the edges, flowers flaking like cigarette paper in our palms. Suddenly, the sky turns into a chameleon, camouflaging from blue to brown to black, gobbling up the fireball of a sun. A tepid rain soon follows. The soft rumble of rain turns into a sudden pounding—or, perhaps, as Salinger said, falling in buckets…like a bastard. I am stranded in the library, feeling the city pulse with a sudden relief and vigour—skidding bikes, rushing cars, a bunch of people darting towards the shaded chai-tapri.