I feel the fidget start in my legs. This is what happens when we talk about Mum. My body wants to run. Living with Mum has always been complicated. Before the fire (or BTF as I say), she vanished into herself, like a ghost, and every time I tried to talk to her it was as if she couldn’t hear me. What if that happens again?

‘Honey, the house will be finished really soon. We won’t be crammed in the flat together for long.’

‘I just didn’t think it would happen yet.’ And it’s true. It’s not that I don’t want Mum around. I do. But I’m not ready for everything else that comes with it.

‘Clem?’ he says, releasing my hand.

I see the red mark his ring has made on my finger. I see how much he wants me to want this, too. And so I pull out an old smile, one I’ve used before, and pretend. ‘Yeah. It’ll be good.’

‘It really will.’ Dad leans in and half hugs me, like it’s all sorted. But inside I ache. Since our house burnt down, I’ve had so many changes. I had to move to a new flat and to a new primary school. And now that I’m about to start high school, I just want all the changes to stop. I want to rewind to a couple of years ago when the biggest thing in my life was buying a new pair of sneakers.

‘Okay, kiddo, ready for your swim?’

I try to change gears as fast as he has. ‘Thought you’d never ask,’ I say, caught between relief that we’ve finished the ‘Mum’ topic and terror that it’s been decided so quickly.

He stands and holds out his hand to pull me up. This time, when I take his hand, I feel the row of calluses on his skin. But they’re older and tougher than mine.

‘Under that bandage it looks like a giant has taken a bite out of the trunk,’ he says, looking over my shoulder at the Separation Tree. ‘Poor old thing.’ He reaches out to rub the edge of its scar.

‘It’s flowering. That’s a good sign, isn’t it?’ I say, looking up at the tiny spots of colour blooming among the leaves.

‘Yeah. I reckon,’ Dad says, but his eyes have lost their twinkle.

Suddenly, a whirring sound starts behind us and a whip of water flicks over our legs, sharp and cold. It takes me a second to realise what it is, but Dad is already off, racing across the lawn to where the sprinkler is sending streams of water into the air.