As I stepped out of the F train at Seventh Avenue I saw a flash of white below me, nestled in the dark space below the platform lip. Something like a shroud. Enveloping a body? I had to step off, and could only look back to see my fellow travelers following across the threshold, unconcerned.

Was it someone dead? Someone alive? Some poor soul who made his bed there, in the margin of the tracks?

I waited for the train to leave and the crowd to thin out. Then I leaned over to have a look. It was hard to see. I felt myself beginning to lose my balance. But there it was: a tangled, white sheet, maybe two. Empty, as far as I could tell. At least now.