EAU DE PUBLIC TRANSIT

Then I smelled it. The same odor emanating off the homeless man, intensified. I twisted in my chair, straining to see where he had fallen. Whereas before the smell had been a gentle, insidious waft, it was now a full-on fist-punch to the face. I couldn't help myself; I gagged. And the young woman? Where was she?

The commuter types noticed it too. They sniffed at the air and recoiled. Some looked around for the source.

I saw it before they did.

I pointed at a shapeless heap by the closed doors and said, "There."

The nearest man — a man of action, I could tell by his pressed slacks — nodded and knelt beside the pile. He grabbed a rolled up newspaper and poked the top of it.

Something skittered in the blue shadows. I couldn't see clearly, but I could hear it, like nails stagger-tapping against a table top.

The man jumped and slapped at his arm.

"What is it?" asked a female passenger.

"Did I get it off?" He turned to her, eyes wide and crazy. "Did you see it?"

"I… don't see anything."

He shivered. "It was on my arm."

"What?" asked the woman.

The man nudged the pile with his foot.

"Maybe you shouldn't — "

The pile exploded into a splash of wriggling, contorted fragments. A new smell leapt from the skittering heap like a blast, this one redolent of mildewed earth, brine and rotten things, decaying, secret things of former flesh. If I'd been standing I would have been forced to the ground.

Then the screams started. Screams of shock and pain. Little insect-like creatures burrowing under business suits, rappelling up trouser legs on thin strands of mandible-produced silk.

Beneath the disintegrating pile I could just make out the young woman. Her pale mouth opened and closed several times. One of the insect shadows circled her lips like a drain and took the plunge.

At first the bugs ignored my withered flesh, but then they grew bold. Although I could not feel them advance, I finally had to admit the strange lumps under my blanket were moving closer. The most agile suit-wearers were having a small success brushing the creatures aside, stomping their little heads to a pulp.

But my wheelchair was strapped to the wall. No matter how many lumps I smashed with my fists, they still came.

There was nowhere to go. No one to help.

So I closed my eyes. I breathed through my mouth. And I waited.