Theo pours two margaritas from a crystal pitcher on the sideboard.
“Okay, introductions,” he announces.
Before he has a chance to start, Clementine focuses her attention on me. “Wait, I know you.”
“Me?” I point at myself and then glance over my shoulder to see if there’s another famous person standing behind me. The way tonight is going I wouldn’t be surprised.
“You know . . . her?” Finn asks, his voice dripping with shock.
“Yes, you brought me a tea. Didn’t you?” Clementine asks, oblivious to Finn’s incredulous tone.
Technically, she’s correct. I brought Clementine a mug of chamomile tea when she came into the radio station last year to do an interview with Elvis Duran, the host of our morning show. Over the past three years, I’ve brought all manner of beverages to every type of celebrity at the radio station: a Diet Coke for Katy Perry, a Red Bull for Snoop Dogg, a venti mocha Frappuccino for Ed Sheeran. Most don’t bother to say thank you, and I can count on one hand the ones who ask my name. I certainly didn’t expect Clementine Del to remember me a year later. I’m instantly won over by the gesture. “Um, yes. At Z100, right?”
“I knew it! I never forget a face. Names are another story, though. Remind me of yours?” Clementine unfolds herself from the couch and reaches out her hand to shake.
“I’m Hannah.”
“Lovely to meet you. Again, as it is.” She rolls her eyes at her own forgetfulness. “Everyone calls me Clem.”
“Clem,” I parrot back as I shake her hand.
“And this is Priya,” Theo jumps in. He throws an arm over Priya’s shoulder, while her mouth hangs open as she struggles to process this evening’s unexpected turn.
“Lovely to meet you,” Clementine says. She collapses back on the couch, tucking one leg up underneath her.
“So,” Finn prods, “you were about to tell us how you two met before they got here.”
“Ah yes,” Theo muses. He settles back into the couch next to Clementine and they exchange a look like they’re having a silent conversation about whether or not to tell us.
“We dated!” Clementine blurts. She leans into Theo and gives him a playful nudge with her shoulder.
She probably expected a laugh, but her announcement lands like a bomb. The room is engulfed in a shocked silence.
Surely this would have made the tabloids. You can’t check out at a grocery store without Clementine staring back at you from the cover of a glossy magazine under a headline about her scandalous trip to Cabo or whether she’s fallen out with Princess Beatrice again. So, this must mean it was a while ago, before we met Theo, or surely Finn would have noticed him on the gossip blogs.
“When was this?” I ask, imagining a teenaged Theo in a prep-school blazer, cheeks speckled with acne, dating a pre-Hollywood Clementine Del. I picture her as a drama nerd. Maybe she knew Theo was gay all along and was his beard until he was ready to come out.
“Last summer,” Clementine replies. “Well, not this past summer, the summer before, I mean.”
So that would mean Theo was dating Clementine Del right before he hooked up with Finn? That was so . . . recent.
“We met at Ascot,” Clem continues. “I was there with my old schoolmate, Peach. Her real name’s Penelope, Peach is just a nickname. A Clementine and a Peach! We used to try to pass ourselves off as twins, even though we look nothing alike. Although Clementine is my given name.”
She notices Finn and I eyeing each other. “Sorry! I’m boring you,” she says, “I always do that. Too many details! The short of it is, we met at a ludicrously boring, not to mention inhumane, horse race we were both forced to attend. Meeting Theo was the only redeeming part of the day!”
Theo picks up where she left off. “Clem was on a break from touring and her manager sent her to schmooze some smarmy record exec. Except it turns out the record exec was my friend Ollie’s father. His dad got totally rat-arsed the night before and had one hell of a hangover, so he sent Ol in his stead, and I tagged along. We thought it would be a laugh. You know: dress up, get pissed on Pimms, place some bets. So we went. Then imagine our surprise when Clem and Peach show up at our box.
“Not a bad day at all,” he continues, “I won five thousand pounds. But Clem was the real prize.” Theo and Clementine exchange saccharine smiles on the sofa.
“I told him I wouldn’t go on a date with him unless he donated his winnings. I couldn’t stand the thought of someone profiting off animal cruelty,” Clementine says. “Although if I’d known how loaded he was, I would have made him triple it!”
Theo gives a hearty laugh and I get the sense their lines in this story have been polished over many retellings to captive audiences at swanky cocktail parties. I attempt to school my face into a bland smile and think of a polite follow-up question. But every question that comes to mind is deeply impolite: I’m sorry, you also date women? You dated her?! What’s Theo like in bed? What’s Clementine Del like in bed?
“After Ascot we absconded to Capri for a few weeks. Clem had never been. Can’t say she saw much of the island—”
“And it’s a small island!” She braces her hand on his arm for emphasis. “We mostly stayed in the room if you get me.”
We get it. You banged.
“But after Capri, I was off to Hong Kong to continue my tour and Theo was spending the summer in California.”
Theo picks up the story baton. “Suffice it to say, things didn’t work out. We were rarely on the same continent, never mind in the same city.”
“He’s the only person I know who travels more than I do.”
“We called it two months later, but she’s the only ex I’ve managed to stay friends with.” How lucky for us! I remind myself not to roll my eyes.
“We see each other whenever we’re in the same place, which is less often than you’d think,” says Clementine.
Theo and Clementine share a private smile. Oh my god, are they going to have sex tonight? Or maybe they already did before we got here. I feel weird thinking about this. I had put Theo in a certain box, and if I’m honest, assumed it was only a matter of time before he and Finn got together. That was the whole reason I agreed to Christmas at Theo’s, after not seeing him for a year—so Finn could see if there was really something between them, now that Theo is back in New York. But there are some new variables in the mix. I look over at Finn to see how he’s taking all of this and watch him drain half his margarita in one long gulp.
“Alas, he’s the one who got away!” Clementine teases.
Finn starts choking on his drink and lets out a hacking cough. “Sorry, wrong pipe,” he covers.
Undeterred, Clementine smiles beatifically up at Theo and winds their hands together on the couch cushion between them. Theo shows no signs of discomfort.
“Well,” he coos at her, “I’m here now!”
“And I leave next week!” she adds with an exaggerated pout, continuing their two-person show.
“Clem’s on tour again at the moment,” Theo adds for our sake, although I’m well aware. The radio station has been playing ads for Jingle Ball, which Clementine headlined, every fifteen minutes for the past six weeks and it’s my job to queue them up. “And I figured Clem would fit in well with you lot. She’s a bit of a stray, too.”