Hometown dates ended with one very sad car ride back home.
On the March 13 episode of The Bachelor, Zach Shallcross visited the hometowns of his four remaining contenders—Gabi, Ariel, Charity and Kaity—to varying degrees of success.
First, Zach traveled to Vermont to sample maple syrup with bona fide expert Gabi. After Zach was unable to correctly identify which maple syrup was real and which was fake (so embarrassing!), he met Gabi's parents, brother and sister, which went way better than the syrup disaster earlier in the day.
Up next, it was time for Zach to meet Ariel's family in New York City. After a successful day of pizza sampling, a trip to a Jewish deli and Ariel taking Zach to her favorite speakeasy, Zach met up with her immediate family—which was very awkward.
Like very, very awkward.
After Ariel's brother Bobby asked Zach, "Do you really believe in such a short amount of time that you can actually get to know a person?," he went for the jugular.
"When's my sister's birthday?" Bobby continued, as Zach shook his head. "If you don't know somebody's birthday, how do you really know a person? Do you know my sister's middle name?"
Zach, unfortunately, didn't know that either.
Finally free from Bobby, Zach headed to Columbus, Ga. to meet Charity's family and friends. After an outdoor lunch and an emotional conversation between Charity and her adoring brother—who we're already putting in a call to be the next Bachelor—Charity took Zach line dancing, where she opened up about her true feelings once outside the bar.
"I think it's safe to say," she told Zach, "that I'm honestly falling in love."
Zach kissed her and said, "Wow, it's so crazy. You don't know how good that feels." However, he stopped short at reciprocating.
Last but not least, Zach jumped over to his own hometown of Austin, Texas to meet Kaity, who moved to the city just three weeks before filming the show. Because she's so new in town, Kaity had some grocery shopping and furniture building to do, so she put Zach to work!
After a day of errands, Zach met up with Kaity's family, including her mother—who asked if he "might be falling in love with Kaity."
"I understand the strength and power of saying 'I love you' to someone," Zach responded. "It's not a word that can just be tossed around in my book. I can tell you this, I can absolutely see myself falling in love with her."
So you're saying there's a chance!
Once back at the mansion, Zach and the four women gathered for the rose ceremony—where he handed out roses to Ariel, Kaity and Gabi.
After being escorted out by Zach, a visibly emotional Charity was at a loss for words, but eventually mustered, "This is hard. Like, really hard."
Zach then complicated matters, saying, "I might be making the wrong decision," to which Charity emphatically responded, "No, don't say that."
Once alone in the SUV on her way out of the mansion, Charity became more vocal about how she was feeling.
"It doesn't make sense," she said. "It makes no f--king sense to me. Sometimes that's just the way life goes and it sucks, but it just means I'm one step closer to finding who I need to be with."
Charity was crying, Zach was crying, we were all crying.
Time to wipe those tears fast, though, because The Bachelor: The Women Tell All airs Tuesday, March 14 at 8 p.m. on ABC, with new episodes of The Bachelor airing Mondays at 8 p.m. on the network.