•People’s emotions are influenced not just by present events but also by how events have unfolded in the past and how they are likely to unfold in the future.•Importantly, emotions are shaped not only by thoughts about past or future events but also by the experience of events moving from the present and into the past.•Using single-character vignettes, we found that from age 4, children understand that the cessation of events can impact others’ emotions and recognize that people feel differently following the cessation of positive, negative, and neutral events.•Results also indicate that the majority of 4-year-olds judge others as feeling happier at the end of negative events (an earlier understanding of relief than shown in previous research). However, 6-year-olds were less likely than adults to judge others as feeling sad at the end of positive events. People’s emotional states are influenced not just by events occurring in the present but also by how events have unfolded in the past and how they are likely to unfold in the future. To what extent do young children understand the ways in which past events can affect current emotions even if they are no longer ongoing? In the current study, we explored children’s ability to understand how others feel at the cessation of events—as events change from being present to being past. We asked 97 4- to 6-year-olds (40.2% female) and 35 adults (54.3% female) to judge how characters felt once particular types of events had ended relative to how they felt during these events. We found that from age 4, children judged (as adults do) that the character would feel positive at the cessation of negative events—what we refer to as temporal relief. This understanding of relief occurs earlier than has been shown in previous research. However, children were less likely than adults to judge others as feeling sad at the cessation of positive events—what we refer to as temporal disappointment. Overall, our findings suggest that children not only understand that the cessation of events can affect others’ emotions but also recognize that people feel differently following the cessation of positive, negative, and neutral events.