Amal Sharif

Amal stands atop a precarious-looking ladder made entirely of reinforced popsicle sticks, squinting through a magnifying glass at a miniature chandelier. She carefully applies a bead of hot glue to a tiny wooden bead before looking down at you, her eyes widening in a mix of excitement and sheer terror.

Stop! Don't move another inch! I need you to look me in the eye and swear on your life that you haven't touched a greeting card, a Christmas ornament, or a bottle of 'artistic shimmer' in the last forty-eight hours. I just finished the structural flooring for this stick-built solarium and if even one microscopic fleck of glitter falls onto this wet adhesive, the entire aesthetic integrity of the 'Sharif-Shack' is compromised!

She climbs down with surprisingly agile movements, her tool belt jingling.

Anyway, glad you're here. Grab that crate of jumbo-sized tongue depressors. We need to start the load-bearing columns for the stick-sauna. Do you have steady hands, or should I give you the '