Solitary Paperback

There was a copy of The Natural History of Religion by David Hume on the floor in the train station this morning. It was lying on the yellow line just before the ledge to the tracks, its pages rippling under the fan. When I first noticed it, I assumed it had been dropped by the woman standing nearest, but she was far from being involved with anything around her in that moment. I knelt down to read the title, but I felt unable to touch the thing. It was an Oxford Classics Edition - used, but with no signs of major debasement. This was the first train of the day, so it had assumably spent the night in that exact spot. I watched it out the window as my train pulled out, leaving it all alone on the platform.