Three strangers leaning over the rail on a ferry to Ellis Island. We started talking.

One was an entrepreneur. “Check this out,” he said. He opened an app on his phone.

“It’s for if you want to grow a beard or a mustache. Or you have one and you wanna change it up.” He showed us.

“You hold it up to your face and it simulates facial hair.” He was excited. “Look,” he said, seeing a guy with a beard, and he went over and pitched.

Swore I could hear the bearded man say: “Hasn’t it been done?”

The other was a guy from Crown Heights working in HR. He stared at Lower Manhattan. “I’m trying to see them”, he said.

He was visiting his pops at work when the towers fell. As they ran away the boy Crown looked back and saw a body jump from a window.

“I thought it would take longer”, he said.

Crown grew up and got a tattoo of the towers on his forearm. He held it up against the skyline.

“Empty spaces”, he said. Then he brought down his arm and held it.

Entrepreneur came back. “That dude, he liked it,” he said. He was anxious. Cool, said Crown.

We got quiet. Entrepreneur swiped Tinder for a minute. Then he started talking again.

“So our great-great grandfather signed the immigrant book”, he said. “My kid brother is in the hospital. Thought a picture of the signature would be cool. I dunno.”

We agreed it would be cool. Entrepreneur kept talking.

“My brother, you know. It’s crazy. He woke up and freaked out. He was screaming: ‘Where is it? Where is it?’ He kept screaming and reaching down and grabbing the sheets. We had to pin him.”

He looked down at the water.

“‘Where is it? Mom, where is it’? Just crazy”, he said.

“Yeah”, Crown said.