David, who loves splashing into swimming pools and is scared of spiders in the basement, went quiet and turned back to watching a Pink Panther video.

‘The Police Can Hear You’

In August 2014, Ryann Louris was 20 years old, barely older than the teenager whose death set off protests outside her front door. Her home was so close to the chaos of the marches and the tear gas, she could hear the police even with her windows shut. When she pushed her tiny daughter, Journey, in her stroller, she could see enormous military-style vehicles that looked like tanks, things that she thought belonged in Iraq, not with local law enforcement forces preparing for protesters in the parking lot of a Target in suburban St. Louis.

Now she lives with her two daughters — Journey, 6, and Joi, 4, in a two-bedroom house a few miles away from the protests, near a small park with a playground and a tennis court. Her block is usually quiet, except for the comforting chatter from her neighbors on their front porch across the street.

Sometimes it seems too quiet. Down the block, houses are empty, boarded up, weeds sprouting where neat lawns used to be. Blight and abandoned houses have become a problem in Ferguson. Many people who have the means to move are simply leaving, and homes that go on the market often sit for long stretches; who wants to buy a house in Ferguson?

Ella Jones, a City Council member, said more than 600 houses stand empty, according to 2017 data. In apartments along Canfield Drive, a winding road dotted with low-slung rental buildings where Mr. Brown was killed, former residents said nearly everyone they knew had moved away.