" I've heard that in the moments before an earthquake, all nature falls completely silent. Birds alight and stop chirping, squirrels stop running, rivers stop flowing.

I don't know if this is true or not, but that's what the meeting felt like at that moment. An eerie, unnatural quiet before something awful. "

― Ann M. Martin , Stacey vs. the BSC (The Baby-Sitters Club, #83)