Last week’s rose ceremony drama spilled over into the Nov. 2 episode ofThe Bachelorette. Although things started out on a high for Michelle Young this week with a successful group date and one-on-one, tensions rose during the second group date. Jamie Skaar, who was the source of last week’s drama, was on the date with a group of other men.
Jamie had a one-on-one date last week. Afterward, at the cocktail party, he told Michelle that a lot of the guys in the house were speculating that she had a relationship with fellow contestant, Joe Coleman, before coming on the show. In reality, none of the guys were really talking about that at all. In fact, it was Jamie himself who was concerned. Michelle confronted the rest of the group about whether or not they trusted her, and they were caught off guard. Jamie never came clean, and the mystery over who gossiped to Michelle continued on the Nov. 2 episode.
Michelle Young on the Nov. 2 episode of ‘The Bachelorette.’ (ABC)
“I haven’t told the guys, necessarily, that I’m the guy who went and talk to Michelle,” Jamie admitted. “But that’s because it doesn’t matter. Frankly, at this point…I don’t care. I’m good.” On the group date, the guys were tasked with telling personal stories about themselves in a spoken word poem. Instead, Jamie told a bizarre fictional story, which had some of the guys starting to question what his deal was.
Despite his strange performance, Jamie was confident going into the after-party. “It’s really not a competition at this point,” Jamie said in a confessional. “I think it’s been shown that I’m coming in here with a different mentality than a lot of other people. There’s really not anyone else worthy of her attention. No one else really matters to me. A lot of guys here are looking for the chance to be seen, but I feel like her and I communicate on a different level.”
Jamie was over-confident that he would get the group date rose, but Michelle gave it to Brandon Jones instead. Needless to say, Jamie was shocked, and he pulled a producer aside to vent about it. “I’m really competing with Brandon for a woman’s attention?” he wondered. “You’re telling me we’re in the same league? We’re not even f***ing close. I gotta wait for six weeks to get to the end of this? I really thought it’d be a stronger group of guys.”
Then, he turned his attention from dissing the guys…to dissing Michelle. “My problem with Michelle right now is I feel like she’s in spring break mode,” he said. “If you genuinely thought your husband was in the room, do you go into spring break mode? I’m not going to judge it, but that doesn’t mean I can’t make fun of it.”
Michelle Young and Jamie Skaar on their one-on-one date. (ABC)
At the cocktail party, Rick Leach finally got to the bottom of who lied to Michelle. First, he took it upon himself to defend the guys in the house against the mystery man’s accusation. “Whoever came to you with that information abut people questioning your character…that couldn’t have been further from the truth,” he told her. “I’ve been close with all the guys here — none of them were ever questioning your character. I feel like that person could’ve done it to try and earn your trust and try to up themselves and put other people under the bus.”
Michelle was shocked, and she admitted to Rick that Jamie was the guy who made the accusations to her. Rick brought this information to Nayte Olukoya and Casey Woods, and the three of them decided to confront Jamie themselves. Jamie stammered through an explanation and got flustered when Nayte pushed him to share what he told Michelle. The conversation eventually filtered in with the rest of the group, with Jamie remaining on the defense.
When Michelle walked into the room, she noticed the tension, and Jamie tried to explain his side. Michelle stood her ground and shared what really happened during their conversation — and how she realized that Jamie was manipulating her. “You brought up that one of your friends had seen me in Minnesota walking with a light-skinned dude,” Michelle explained. “That’s the message you gave me after saying that people in the house were speculating. So when you put those two things together, it created the emotions that I came down here and expressed. Why was that piece of information [about the man I was walking with] added?”
Michelle pulled Jamie outside to talk, and told him she was sending him home. “I feel like our trust was completely broken,” she said. “This message that you told me was not only not accurate, but this drama was created around my character. You brought up that second story — YOU put that out there, Jamie. You did. That’s not protecting me whatsoever. I’m very hurt by you right now. I don’t trust you at this moment and I have to be done with it.”
