Bachelorette Gabby Windey Calls Her Situation with Remaining Suitor Erich a ‘Big Fat Dumpster Fire’

Warning: This post contains spoilers from Tuesday’s episode of The Bachelorette.

Night one of the Bachelorette finale kicked off with host Jesse Palmer bringing Bachelorettes Rachel Recchia and Gabby Windey out to the studio.

Then Jesse threw it back to Mexico to show how Rachel and Zach’s conversation before the rose ceremony ended.

“I’m sure you feel that the Fantasy Suite felt a little off with us,” Zach, 25, said to Rachel. “And you know, since Day 1, I’ve always been honest with you, upfront about my feelings. And to be honest, I thought what I was seeing wasn’t the real Rachel.”

Zach added that he felt “upset” and “disappointed” in the Rachel he encountered that night.

“I do understand maybe you were picking up on a little bit of a different vibe,” Rachel, 26, said. “I have been trying to gain clarity this week as well and I do really feel like I did find it.”

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Rachel explained she “was just trying to find that missing piece” and hoped that spending the night with Zach would help.

“I did really love you, you know,” Zach said. “I saw a future with you, but I need to go.”

Tino and Aven watched Zach leave before Rachel came back inside and offered them both roses.

Back in the studio, Zach came out to talk to Rachel for the first time since Mexico. They started by apologizing to one another.

“I was sick to my stomach the whole week,” Zach recalled of how he felt in the moment. “I just knew from our night in the Fantasy Suite. It felt off.”

“I just really want you to know that you meant so much to me,” Rachel told Zach.

Zach assured Rachel he understood her position. “There’s no one way or right way to navigate it,” he said. “It was just kind of a tough pill to swallow.”

Jesse, 43, asked Zach and Rachel what exactly went down that night in the Fantasy Suite.

“It felt immediately off,” Zach reiterated. “It felt like we were kind of like two strangers in a way. And I think it was the moment that I didn’t fully recognize at that time but maybe you had already realized I wasn’t going to be your future person.”

Though Zach felt like Rachel grilled him about being ready for an engagement, the flight instructor said, “I was never accusing you of not being ready.”

Rachel and Zach both told Jesse they didn’t have any regrets about the way things went down between them.

“I wouldn’t trade anything in the world,” Zach said. “Everything happens for a reason.”

AVEN MEETS RACHEL’S FAMILY

Rachel hyped up both Tino and Aven to her parents and two best friends before he arrived. After Aven, 28, showed up, Rachel’s dad Tony pulled the sales executive for a one-on-one chat.

“I want to know why,” Tony said to Aven. “This is my daughter. She’s my pride and joy. Nobody’s going to take her way from me without a fight.”

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Aven told Tony that he and Rachel shared “a lot of the same values.” “The feelings are so strong and it’s been a progression for us,” he continued. “We’ve built on every single moment we’ve had together.”

Rachel’s mom Mary Anne told her daughter that Aven seemed “very sweet.”

“With Aven, I just feel like I trust him,” Rachel gushed, adding that she had “no doubts in him.”

Meanwhile, Aven told Rachel’s friends Nate and Sam, “I want to be with Rachel at the end of this. I want to have a life with her and I want the engagement aspect of it to be perfect.”

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While Aven assured he could “1,000 percent see myself getting there” with Rachel, he couldn’t honestly tell them that he would be ready to get down on one knee in a few days.

“Getting to a point of a marriage and a life together is something I want with her, it’s just about the timing,” Aven said.

Nate and Sam reported the news back to Rachel when they spoke with her privately.

“The way he words it is, he knows he wants to be with you,” Sam told Rachel. “I think he’s being very logical about this.”

Rachel found this revelation “shocking.” “This is not what he told me,” Rachel said.

When Rachel and Aven touched base, she brought up this concern.

“It’s not about not being ready and I want you to know that nothing has changed in terms of how I feel about you,” Aven said. “I’m falling in love with you and I see a life with you after this and I want to get to that point with you so much. I just want to make sure that it’s 100 percent right for both of us right now and in this very moment in time.”

“That’s hard for me to hear,” Rachel said.

They talked in circles about the subject. “I wanted you to walk in there and be 100 percent,” Rachel said of meeting her family.

Aven apologized if her friends misconstrued his intentions. “I have no doubts in my mind about us getting there, whether it’s in a few days or whatever the case may be, Rachel,” he said. “I just want to be with you and I’m sorry if what they said to you came off differently.”

“What if what I want is to get engaged?” Rachel asked, noting that she wouldn’t “force” him to propose.

“I’m not going to sit here and throw words around in your face because it makes you happy,” Aven said.

They kissed before parting ways.

“I love all of them and I came in here trying to be myself and be real,” Aven said.

In an on-camera interview, Rachel wondered, “I’m not sure how Aven and I move forward from it.”

ERICH MEETS GABBY’S FAMILY

Gabby introduced her last man standing, Erich, to her family. “I did tell him I loved him,” Gabby told her loved ones before Erich’s arrival.

When the real estate analyst, 29, sat down with Gabby and her fam, he told them about his “amazing” his hometown date.

“After that, I was pretty convinced I was falling in love with her,” Erich said.

Erich and Gabby. Craig Sjodin/ABc

Gabby’s aunt Julie said in an on-camera interview that “Gabby’s definitely in love,” too.

Gabby spoke to Grandpa John, who expressed his support for Erich. “I like Erich,” he said. “He’s a keeper.”

Gabby felt the same way. “He’s been nothing but really, really good to me,” she told her grandfather.

Meanwhile, Erich talked to Gabby’s dad Patrick. “We had this crazy connection from the beginning,” Erich explained.

Erich also called Gabby “an amazing person” and said, “I can’t imagine my life without her at this point.”

When Patrick got time alone with his daughter, he wanted to know why she felt so sure about Erich.

“He just loves me in a way that I really haven’t had before,” she replied.

Gabby got emotional to Julie thinking about her fractured relationship with her mom and whether that made her “unlovable.”

“Don’t hide this from Erich,” Julie urged. “If you truly feel like Erich is the one for you, let him be the one to understand you.”

Gabby did feel that Erich was the one for her. “I love Erich more than I thought I could ever really love someone,” she said in an on-camera interview. “And I get emotional thinking about talking to him.”

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TINO MEETS RACHEL’S FAMILY

Rachel admitted to her family before Tino arrived that she didn’t feel as enthusiastic because of how things ended with Aven. “I really felt like me and Aven were on the same page,” she lamented.

But when Tino arrived, Rachel’s attitude turned around as they rehashed their journey to her family. Mary Anne could tell Tino looked nervous and Tony liked seeing his daughter excited.

“I’m excited to see my daughter that happy,” Tony told the cameras.

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Tony asked Tino, 27, what happened on hometowns with his family that caused Rachel to feel uncomfortable.

“I’m 100 percent sure if they get a day with her where we go to the beach, they’ll like fall in love with her just like I did,” the general contractor said to Tony.

Tino also told Tony that Rachel “means the world to me” and promised to “make your daughter happy forever.”

That won Tony over. “I do like you,” Tony said.

Her parents’ support of Tino meant a lot to Rachel. “Today went better than I thought it could’ve went,” she said in an on-camera interview. “Big stamp of approval from everyone.”

RACHEL AND AVEN’S LAST DATE

When Rachel met Aven for their last date before proposal day, they picked up the conversation where it left off.

“The next step in all of this is so important to me because I care about you,” Aven said. “But realizing that, I want more time with you and I want to come visit you in Florida and see where you live. I want you to come visit me. I want to do life outside of this with you and I just feel like that’s so important for us at this point before that next step. And I want us to be fully, fully in love with each other so that that point when we get there is so special for us so we can go right into a marriage.”

Obviously, Rachel did not want to hear that.

“I need you to know how hard it is for me to walk into my family and be like, ‘When Aven says something to me, he means it and he would never lie to me,'” Rachel said. “And I think the one thing I wanted out of this was when you sat down with my family that we were on the same page and I feel so blindsided by you. Like I can’t even tell you.”

Aven still wanted to fight for their relationship. “I want to leave here with you. I want that more than anything,” he told Rachel. “And I’m sitting here trying to fight for it. I know that I might have been, I don’t know what it is — caught up a little bit in some of it.”

“I want someone who’s sure about me and I’m not willing to sacrifice that at the end of the day,” Rachel said.

Rachel believed Aven couldn’t “give me what I need right now” and decided they should part ways.

“I didn’t think I was going to be leaving here without Rachel,” Aven told the cameras.

In the studio, Aven faced Rachel for the first time since their split. “I’m extremely, extremely sorry about the way things ended between us,” he said. “I know that I hurt you.”

Rachel realized, “At the end of the day, you just knew what was right for you and that’s okay. I don’t know that there’s anything we could’ve done to salvage it.”

Aven confessed he didn’t “fully understand” what she wanted in terms of an engagement at the end of the show.

Jesse questioned what changed between the two. Aven cited telling Rachel’s loved ones rather than Rachel herself about his timing for a proposal as “the downfall of the whole thing.”

“I could’ve gone about communicating to you where I was at a lot better,” Aven said.

“You were perfect,” Rachel said, adding that the timing just didn’t align for them.

GABBY AND ERICH’S LAST DATE

Unfortunately, Gabby’s finale date with Erich didn’t end much better.

It started on a good note, though, with the couple professing their love to one another and kissing passionately.

“I truly love you and I do want to spend the rest of my life with you,” Erich said to Gabby. “And I don’t want to rush anything and I don’t want there to be any expectations or anything that wouldn’t be natural to us.”

Gabby told Erich she felt “pretty good” about their future together, but also didn’t want to pressure him to propose.

“I want to date you in the real world, like, I want to date you and getting engaged before that happens is not how things usually go,” Erich said.

Hearing that didn’t make Gabby feel like Erich would be popping the question anytime soon.

“I don’t want anyone to be forced,” Gabby shouted to producers in the hotel hallways after the date. “I’m so sick of this.”

Erich tried to go after her, but to no avail.

“Here we are, big fat dumpster fire,” Gabby told the cameras. “Big f—ing mess.”

The Bachelorette finale airs Tuesday (8 p.m. ET) on ABC.