When the last leaf fell, the city’s clocks all stopped ticking.
At first, no one noticed. The morning haze still blanketed the skyline, and the usual rattle of tram wheels echoed through narrow alleyways. But in the bakery on Elm Street, Ms. Calloway stared at the wall clock above her oven, puzzled. 7:14. It had been 7:14 for what felt like forever.
Across town, Officer Lane tapped his wristwatch impatiently, waiting for it to advance. It didn’t. He tried shaking it. Nothing. At City Hall, the grand clock tower's chime never came. The birds that usually scattered at the strike of each hour remained, curiously perched on rooftops, their eyes wide, as if waiting.
By noon, everyone knew.
Time had stopped.
Not in the philosophical, “where did the day go?” sense—but truly, completely. No clocks ticked. Phones wouldn’t refresh. No seconds passed. Yet people still moved, breathed, and blinked. The sun hung in place, casting long, frozen shadows that refused to shift.
Theories spread like wildfire. Scientists puzzled over it. Priests preached of divine signs. Children played without curfews, for bedtime never came. But it was the oldest woman in the city, Grandma Neela, who whispered what no one wanted to believe:
“The city runs on the life of the Great Tree.”
That tree, rooted deep in the center of Everwyn Square, was older than the city itself. They’d built roads around it, honored it with plaques, even strung lights through its branches during holidays. But no one truly remembered why it stood there.
Except Grandma Neela.
Each autumn, the tree shed its leaves—except one. A single golden leaf always clung to the highest branch, glowing faintly against the dusk sky. As long as it stayed, time moved.
But last night, the final leaf had fallen.
It hadn’t drifted down gently. It had plummeted, like a feather made of lead. The moment it touched the earth, the gears of time froze.
The city panicked. Meetings were called. Time experts consulted. But it was Grandma Neela who took a lantern, walked alone to the empty square, and knelt before the tree’s now-barren limbs.
She sang an old lullaby—one her grandmother had sung when the city was just cobbled paths and wooden carts.
As her voice wavered through the still air, something shimmered on the bark. A bud, tiny and trembling, pushed forth from the tree’s gnarled wood.
From it, a new leaf unfurled—silver and bright.
Far away, the clock tower chimed once.
Then again.
And again.
The people looked up. The birds scattered. The sun inched forward.
Time had returned.
And from that day on, no one questioned the tree again.
They simply waited each year for that last golden leaf, hoping it would never fall.