Page 22 of The Unhinged Christmas of a Cat Lady
The Twelve Days of Jet Lag
Jasper
The driver’s playing something soothing—piano, strings, the sort of instrumental soundtrack that thinks it’s helping. It isn’t. My head’s buzzing, my eyes feel like sandpaper, and every muscle in my back is staging a slow, organised rebellion.
I shift in my seat, trying to find a position that doesn’t feel medically concerning. First class or not, two weeks of hotels, back-to-back meetings and the jet lag equivalent of being repeatedly slapped with a wet pillow has finally caught up with me.
I don’t sleep well on planes. Never have. Something about the hum, the recycled air, the relentless sense of being trapped in a tube—it all keeps my brain twitching just enough to stop rest from happening. I drift. Hover. Float in that half-sleep where your neck clicks at the wrong angle and you have strange dreams about spreadsheets that can talk.
Callum, of course, slept the whole flight. Curled up with his noise-cancelling headphones and a blanket he insisted was “NASA-approved.” He offered me one of those inflatable neck pillows as if that would fix decades of deeply entrenched restlessness and control issues. I think I just stared at him until he put it away.
The truth is, I didn’t really need to be in Singapore.
The deal wasn’t mine. It’s Callum’s company, his client, his success, and he’s more than capable of handling it. Has been for years. But we’ve always had that arrangement when one of us needs an extra set of eyes, a bit of backup, the other shows up. It’s not about necessity. It’s about momentum. And power.
Sometimes, just having a second person in the room tips things. Not because I said anything particularly clever—though I like to think I was at least moderately intimidating—but because the client clocked that Callum had support, that he wasn’t flinging proposals across the table solo.
Strength in numbers. Posturing, basically. But the good kind. The kind that lands you an extra zero at the end of a contract.
And it worked. The client signed. Callum looked five years younger and three inches taller. And all I really did was throw some disapproving looks across the table.
He still sees me as some sort of mentor, which is both flattering and vaguely hilarious. He doesn’t need me. But I suppose it’s easy to forget your own competence when the stakes get high.
So I turned up. I smiled in the right places. I drank very average coffee from very expensive boardrooms. And now I’m crawling back along the M25 in a car that smells faintly of fabric softener and end-of-trip fatigue.
The driver clears his throat. “Traffic’s moving. Should have you back in just under an hour.”
I grunt something that might pass for gratitude and close my eyes again, though sleep is still off somewhere over the Channel.
It’s just before midnight when we finally roll up the drive. I step out into the cool night air, stretch slightly, and blink up at the stars like I might find a second wind somewhere between Orion and Heathrow.
And then I notice it.
The lights.
On, steady, glowing out from the small flat on the right—the annexe, as my solicitor insists on calling it, though Stella's tried more than once to pitch it as a “self-contained executive let.” It’s not. It’s a decent two-bedroom with its own entrance and slightly too much beige.
For half a second, I frown, confused. Then I remember.
Right. The tenant.
Stella sorted it all while I was away. Said it was an easy one. She assured me Miranda is lovely and won’t be any trouble. She told me that part at least five times, which does make me suspicious.
So, I’d asked Callum if he thought Stella was pulling something. Wouldn’t be the first time. She once tried to set me up with one of her relatives under the guise of “urgent marketing consultancy.” That woman had a Pomeranian in a pram and believed Gwyneth Paltrow had been misunderstood.
Callum had rolled his eyes at my question. “Mate, she’s not matchmaking.”
I want to believe him. Maybe my brothers are right. I am turning into a bit of a hermit.
After I say goodbye to the driver, I wheel my suitcase to the door and let myself in. The house is still and cold, just as I left it. No sounds of life from next door, but then it’s nearly midnight; I’m hardly expecting her to be hosting a party already.
I drop my keys onto the side table and head upstairs, too tired to do anything but autopilot. Stripping off the last of the travel-wrinkled layers, I step into the shower and let the water run hot enough to sting.
It doesn’t fix the jet lag or the deep ache behind my eyes, but it’s something.
When I finally crawl into bed, everything hurts in the way that suggests I’m either getting old or allergic to air travel. Possibly both.
Still, I make a note to myself: tomorrow, I’ll do the civilised thing. At the very least, I should introduce myself.
