The Day the Internet Went Quiet

It happened on a Tuesday at 9am. Every screen in the world went blank at precisely the same moment — not dark, but blank. Pure white. People panicked for approximately twenty minutes, which was how long it took for everyone to realise that without the internet, they were obliged to speak to the people beside them. My father talked to our neighbour for the first time in four years — they had been neighbours the entire time, and it turned...