She opened the door to see a man much younger than her father standing there with a holdall over his shoulder. He was looking at the ground so all she could really tell about him was that he had very dark blond hair, which was brushed back away from his face. When he peeked out from beneath his eyebrows he seemed surprised to see her and stood up straighter. His eyes slowly wandered over Jasmine and she crossed her arms across her front. She couldn’t quite read the look on his face, but it was as though he was reevaluating something.

‘I’m looking for Frank and Lisa Burgess,’ he said. His tone was unfriendly.

She suddenly wished she was wearing something other than shorts, and crossed one foot in front of the other in an attempt at modesty.

Jasmine turned to the stairwell and shouted, ‘Dad! There’s someone here for you.’

Moments later Frank appeared, peering around the corner at the top of the stairs. His face lit up when he saw their visitor and he rushed down, arm extended to shake the other man’s hand.

‘I’m not too early, am I? I can come back if you’re busy,’ the stranger said with a smile, much warmer than he had been a moment ago. He almost pushed Jasmine out of the way as he moved towards her father.

‘Lisa!’ Frank called up the stairs. ‘Tim’s here.’

Jasmine heard her mother’s excited exclamation and then before she knew it, Lisa was downstairs with her arms around Tim’s neck in a hug. When Lisa pulled away, Jasmine could see immediately that her mother was attracted to him; she looked flustered. As they talked about how unpleasant the blistering heat outside was, Jasmine took the time to look at their visitor. He was tall and, although she wouldn’t call him good looking, he wasn’t ugly; there was something interesting about his face. As he put his holdall on the floor, his shirt lifted up a little and she could see there was a tattoo across his hip, although she couldn’t see what it was. She noted he had an avocado-sized patch of sweat at the small of his back but other than that you wouldn’t know he had just been outside in this ungodly heat. His skin was tanned, as though he spent a lot of time outside in the sun, and he had tiny flecks of bright white paint on both his face and his muscular arms.

Lisa seemed to remember her daughter was there and turned to her. ‘Jasmine, I want you to meet Tim. Tim’s the man decorating the house for us; he did your bedroom.’

‘Thanks,’ she said, unsure what the proper response was and feeling even more uncomfortable knowing that he had been in her bedroom. That he’d put her new bed together, touched almost every surface.