You’ve been waiting for it, we’ve been waiting for it and obviously our Bachelorette has been waiting for it: Bentley’s back!
Ashley and the guys have traveled to Hong Kong to continue their journey o’ love, but first Ashley has a pesky little problem to figure out: namely, find that elusive closure with Bentley. That’s right, despite having a bevy of boys all eagerly waiting to sweep her off her feet, Ashley is still infatuated with Bentley’s promise of “dot, dot, dot”.
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“He told me he wants to leave on a ‘dot, dot, dot,’ which usually means to be continued,” she says, continuing to repeat the phrase that has now ruined ellipses for women, perhaps forever. So Chris Harrison drops by her hotel room with a surprise announcement: Bentley has flown around the world to speak with Ashley face to face in Hong Kong. “Shut up,” Ashley tells Chris Harrison in shock and then nearly swoons. You can practically hear the thought running through her head: He loves me!
And while Ashley keeps saying that she just wants closure with Bentley so she can feel free to move on with the other guys, it’s obvious that she wants something else entirely — like a proposal. So Ashley regroups and heads to Bentley’s hotel room where he greets her with a kiss. (Uh oh!) They then sit down and Ashely tells him that she needs more than a dot, dot, dot and a promise of maybe later. She wants something more definitive. And Bentley, in his total monotone way, gives her the usual lines where he doesn’t really say anything of substance but she used to eat up anyway (“That’s a reaffirmation that we’re on the same page” and “I think you know where I’m at”). But this time, Ashley’s not having it. “Be a man and put a period on it,” she tells him, carrying this punctuation thing a little too far.
And then when he confirms that it is indeed over between them, Ashley, proving that closure was the last thing she wanted, promptly gets angry (and swearing a lot!), asking him why he came all the way to HK to tell her that. “You just wanted a vacay?” she asks. (Um, obviously.) That’s followed by an awkward silence and then Ashley leaves. And that’s the end of the Bentley and Ashley Love Story, as Ashley tells the camera, “I can’t believe I wasted so much time on Bentley.” Girl, neither can we.
But onward and upward, right? Pretending she’s not still smarting from the “closure” that Bentley’s now dropped on her, Ashley and Lucas head out for a one-on-one date. As the pair stroll through the streets of Hong Kong, Lucas admits that he hasn’t done much traveling before. So Ashley shows him what Big City Life is all about, helpfully pointing out interesting things (“Look, a street market where people are selling things,” says our knowledgeable guide). After a bit of market wandering, the two board a boat for a romantic dinner.
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As they drift along, Ashley asks him appropriate first date questions such as “What’s the hardest thing you’ve ever been through” — though, to her credit, she immediately follows up with, “You don’t have to talk about it.” But Lucas opens up about his divorce, talking about fate and not being right for one another, so Ashley rewards him with a rose.
Next up is the group date and although Blake and Ryan have yet to score some alone time with Ashley, they’re both selected to go. Joining them are Ben, Constantine, Mickey and Ames and as the guys assemble on the beach, Ashley tells them what their fun-filled adventure will be: dragon boat racing! Pairing the guys off, Ashley tells them that each team needs to go out and recruit more people to compete with them. The guys immediately scamper off, each team wanting to score the best boat-load of racers. Constantine and Ben are teammates (and you can only assume it’s for no other reason than the fact that they look almost exactly the same) and when they have trouble recruiting people, they switch strategies and instead focus on their racing outfits. Clearly, this strategy doesn’t work out for them as they fall way behind but still manage to crack jokes (“We’re getting smoked,” notes one and the other responds, “Like salmon, bro”).
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Ames and Mickey’s team ends up winning, which clearly means nothing to anyone except the other guys’ egos, so the group relaxes on the beach for a bit. As they are reclining on the sand, a random, nearby man proposes to his girlfriend and she accepts to the cheers of people standing around. As there is absolutely no way this was pre-arranged by anyone, especially not a TV producer, Ashley is delighted by the coincidence (but also sort of jealous, maybe?).
But it’s time to move onto the drinking part of the group date, where Ashley and the guys gather around for a cocktail party. Ames quickly manages to sneak Ashley into an elevator for some alone time and pushes the button for floor 48. Because there’s nothing as romantic as making out in an elevator, Ames goes in for an extended kiss. It’s hard to say why exactly (maybe it’s Ames’s awkwardness, maybe it’s the fact that there’s a camera crew squished in there with them) but it just might be the most uncomfortable make-out on reality TV ever and it turns out 48 floors is a long way up. But at last they arrive to a rooftop deck, with another amazing view of the Hong Kong skyline, which seems to impress Ashley much more than Ames’ kissing did. Nice try though, buddy.
Then Ben sneaks some alone time with Ashley where they also giggle and make out. As Ben tells the camera how much he has fallen for Ashley, he notes how surprised he was that it happened, calling himself “the biggest skeptic of all.” (Um, actually Ben, I’m pretty sure the biggest skeptic of all isn’t on the show to begin with.) And then Ashley sits down for some alone time with Ryan, who has been increasingly getting on the nerves of all the other guys. Though it’s not immediately apparent why they dislike him so much, it’s obvious Ashley doesn’t feel the same way: she gives him the date rose to the disappointment of the other guys.
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The next day, Ashley has a one on one date with JP where they forgo any pretense of adventure and go straight to a romantic meal. Ashley decides that it’s time she come clean to JP about her feelings for Bentley and his reappearance in Hong Kong. Explaining how she finally got the closure she wanted, she told him that she just wanted to be honest with him because, “I feel so strongly for you.” JP, of course, takes it well and gives her the perfect response because he is clearly 100% melty-heart over her. They then head up to another rooftop to check out some more of that HK skyline. The date is a little dull but it’s clear at this point that JP is a total front-runner, especially now that Bentley is out of the way. Obviously, JP gets the date rose.
And at long last (was it just me or did this episode seem to go on forever?), it’s Rose Ceremony time. As Ashley excitedly heads to the cocktail party — she’s practically skipping — her voiceover talks about how eager she is to tell the guys the truth about Bentley. Gathering them together around her, she confesses that she’d “fallen for Bentley” and that hadn’t been able to forget him and that he’d flown all the way around the world to come and see her. It’s an incredibly harsh way to phrase it but she tries to spin it around in the end, telling them she’s so glad that the “best” guys were still with her. Her confession is met by silence and the anger is palpable. When the guys do finally pipe up, it’s an all out attack on Ashley.
Constantine accuses her of being dishonest and Blake (rightly) points out that things must have gone south with Bentley when he visited otherwise he’d still be around — which clearly isn’t much of a consolation to the guys. “I’m glad you got closure,” Lucas says. “But we’re putting a lot on the line too.”
As Ashley walks away, the guys continue to seethe. JP, Ryan and Ames try to talk the guys down a bit but there’s no soothing Constantine (“I’m done”), Lucas (“I hate wasting my time”) and Blake (“I don’t want to play second fiddle to anyone”). Mickey’s anger is more of the slow-burning kind, as he waits until he has Ashley alone to tell her that he thinks she “lied” and tells her to send him home. She tells him to “take the initiative and leave” if that’s what he wants — and he does. As the guys see him board a boat, they seem to realize that they’re supposed to be wooing Ashley, not attacking her, and they accept her tearful apology before the official Rose Ceremony begins. With Mad Mickey already gone, only one more guy has to go, and it’s Bitter Blake who’s given the boot. As he leaves, his parting words are, “Basically, I just want a friend.” Saddest goodbye sentence in the history of The Bachelor/Bachelorette? Most likely.
So that’s it for this week, though the preview for the rest of the season has already promised buckets of tears from our Bachelorette as well as another surprise return from — someone? Come back next week to check out the recap.
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Megan Gibson is a reporter at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @MeganJGibson. You can also continue the discussion on TIME’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.