stepped out onto their porches, not to talk, but to stand and look around, as if they were all noticing the same invisible shift. A delivery van sat idling at the corner, its driver leaning on the steering wheel, staring at his phone. Even the usual background noises—the construction two blocks away, the kids playing in the courtyard—seemed to fade. Nobody said anything, but everyone felt it: an ordinary day had quietly turned into the kind of memory people would talk about later, starting stories with, “Do you remember that morning when everything suddenly went quiet?”