The Bachelorette: Tayshia: Week 7: Not the Fantastical Fairytale

Of course, I didn't get my act together to start on time tonight, but at least my local ABC affiliate is back on DirecTV and can watch it without any weird internet glitches. Hallelujah, it's a Christmas miracle. 

Tonight is the first of two nights wrapping up the season. Fantasy suites and meeting Tayshia's family. 

She is coming off the high of "hometowns," but feeling the anxiety of the final stretch. 

Zac points out how awkward it is to be around Brendan and Ivan now.

Brendan talks about not wanting things to go bad again since he's had one divorce. 

Tayshia talks with JoJo. There are positives but hesitations with all three. She does think she could fall in love with more than one person. 

JoJo says it gets harder with overnights. She took all of her relationships to a higher level, but gave her some clearer pictures too. 

Chris Harrison goes to talk to the guys. He hands out the first date card. Zac seems to be acting kind of the jerk today. Just coming off jerky. Just throwing that in. 

"Ivan -- Our love is timeless."

I don't know if it's better to go first or last. Ivan wanted to go first.

When Tayshia arrives, he notices that Ivan is hot and sweaty, but she has plans to cool him off. There are two troughs full of ice water sitting out in middle of a grassy area. They are going for the world's longest coldest kiss. 

They need to go longer than five minutes and sixteen seconds. 

Chris Harrison has a commentator with him. Big Paulie. I don't know who that is. Big Paulie thinks there will be some pain. 

So, I looked this up. Big Paulie is a security guard/bouncer/stage manager for the show. When you can't have a lot of non-quarantined outsiders come in, I guess that's what you do. Onto the ice water, I'm cold just watching this. However, the underwater shot reveals it isn't ice all the way down. They are going to have a hard time staying lip-locked because they can't breathe. 

Big Paulie was supposedly an abandoned orphan on a glacier. They think this my hurt Ivan's overnight performance. 

Don't know if it was accurate, but Chris proclaimed the water was 40 degrees. They go a minute over the record. 

Brendan is trying to focus is attention elsewhere... "Out of sight, out of mind." Zac says it's about trusting Tayshia to do what she needs to do to figure this out.

"Zac -- Let's explore each other."

Brendan doesn't like this wording.

Back to Ivan... As they sit down to fake dinner, they talk about their record setting day. Tayshia talks about how comfortable they are with each other. They have cried in front of each other. He was the first she broke down walls with. 

Ivan shares that he's falling in love with her, and that he should have told her earlier. She says she hasn't known where he's been on things, but she's falling for him too. Of course, they are sharing a suite when the key comes. 

Their fantasy suite is an RV, by the way.

Tayshia says that Ivan is everything... They send the camera crew off pretty quick.

According to Ivan, they stayed up all night in the airstream talking. He could propose to Tayshia now. 

The way Tayshia tells it, they laughed over the things they had in common, but also had deeper conversations. 

Zac and Brendan aren't looking forward to Ivan coming back and sharing what happened. Ivan says they watched the sunrise together and that they didn't sleep.

Zac heads out for his date.

They head to the LaQuinta spa. There's only so much to do at the resort. Zac's muttering on about exploring.

They are going to explore each other through painting their bodies and rolling around on a canvas. They start with handprints. How stupid. 

Tayshia isn't sure she'd enjoy this date with anyone else. Who knows why.

She likes a guy with a little bit of swag and thinks he has some. One person's definition of jerky is another's definition of swag, I guess. 

After making a grand mess of paint, they somehow end up Pepto Bismol pink laying around on the canvas. Them kissing is gross because he has to taste like paint. 

via GIPHY

They outdoor shower off while sucking face.

At "dinner," listening to him blather on is boring. Tayshia asks him statements he made to his mom about not wanting kids, but telling her (Tayshia) she wanted all these kids. By saying he just wanted to be the fun uncle, he was protecting himself. From there, he wants to tell her something. He tells her that he loves her. (The differentiation here that he doesn't say "falling.") She replies back that she loves him too. She is trying to find things wrong, but she's so happy. 

Off they go for the evening. They have a hotel room, not an Airstream.

The next morning, they are dancing on a bed. He says there were moments of kissing and passion as well as time of getting to know each other. He feels as confident as he has been about their relationship. 

He professes his love again before leaving and heading back to the other two men. 

Ivan doesn't want to hear it. Brendan asks. Zac says the making art was the exploring part of their date. An odd way of just saying what went down. He adds that it all showed that Tayshia was the real deal. 

It's Brendan's turn now. His date card said, "Let's see what the future holds."

Brendan is the most unsure of the three, that's for sure. He was the first she started falling in love with. She thinks he is definitely husband material. 

They enter into a room where Neil Lane is playing the piano. Why he's meeting the diamond guy now, who knows? Neil starts off showing earrings... A pearl and diamond bracelet. 

Brendan seems unsure of all that is going on. Neil keeps saying to not get nervous. He shows wedding rings for her and bands for him. He's not saying anything while Tayshia's talking about what she likes. 

Even as they look at men's rings, he doesn't say much. His voiceover talks about having done this before. He plans the next time he proposes to be it for life. 

Neil talks about seeing all the couples who have been engaged on the show and where they are now. Brendan still doesn't say anything. 

Tayshia can't read him. She sees some kind of disconnect now. 

Tayshia thinks that she just needs to let Brendan know how she feels. She thought the day was fun and said he must have been surprised about the day. 

She talks about how their first date went and what she has thought all along, but where is he now? He says today reinforced the gravity of what's going on. The rings and proposal talk were challenging for him. When he came here, he thought he was ready. However, knowing she is ready and wanting something so bad... He wants a wife and kids so bad, but he realizes there is a big part of him still broken and needs time to heal and grow.

He isn't ready to give his whole heart because it isn't complete. 

A younger version of Tayshia would be mad at him right now, but they've been through marriage before, and she's not going to try to push someone who isn't ready. She offers to walk him out. 

It's a tearful goodbye for her because there was something there from day 1.

Rachel Lindsey arrives the next morning to talk to Tayshia. Rachel plans to be the big sister Tayshia never wanted. She explains to Rachel that after her first date with Brendan she thought they were going to get married. Yet, he left.

They talk about the two that are left. Ivan has always been solid, but Zac wasn't someone that stood out at first. 

They then talk about Ben and his lack of emotion, but she knew there was something there. Conversation moves on to proposal. 

Meanwhile, the men prepare for a rose ceremony. 

At the same time, Ben arrives at Chris Harrison's door. The last interaction was so unlike how their relationship had been going. He needs to tell her that he loves her. He's been thinking that maybe Tayshia felt the same, but didn't know where he stood. 

There are two roses and only two men left, but Tayshia feels it is very important to have this rose ceremony. 

Before that can happen, Ben knocks on the door. He asks if he can come in and talk. He was caught off guard, not knowing what to do or say. He didn't know what he was feeling, but finally realized he was in love with her. He confesses blowing it in the moment. He was terrified because he'd never felt that way before. He's not sure what to do. he doesn't know what he's asking for, but he couldn't leave without telling her. 

Tayshia needs a minute. 

And so ends the evening.