Sound in subway
There is a sound in the subway this morning, a single sound made by an ill-fitted fan belt or a bearing in need of lubrication. It flies high and constant over the crowd here, not loud, but present through the MTA announcements, disappearing in the clamor of the arriving uptown 9 train,
floating back up after the doors chime shut and last car clatters up the tunnel.
It is a note, a held note (what is real term?) as if played on a single violin string, one of those notes from the old murder movies, used to build a sense of dread, the feeling that something deadly was about to happen and that it would happen as soon as the note ended, but this sound, this note, does not end. It goes on and on, neither rising nor falling, it seems to bear down on us.

Newcomers to the platform look around at us, catching the dread from just the sound.