Bachelorette Recap: Four Contestants Are Eliminated, Leaving Chris “Cupcake” in Tears

This week’s episode of The Bachelorette kept the drama at a fever pitch -- due in no small part to the fact that the ticking relationship timebomb of Kaitlyn Bristowe and Nick Viall sleeping together hasn’t yet been revealed to the other guys. But even with that fact simmering in the background but never boiling over, plenty of other drama reared its head for Kaitlyn this week.

When Week 7 picks up with Shawn kinda freaking out about his relationship with Kaitlyn, her immediate fear is that Shawn knows what happened between her and Nick:

Kaitlyn has made it clear she’s not ashamed of sleeping with Nick -- they’re consenting adults who happen to be way into each other, and let’s not lose sight of the fact that they might even be just a few short weeks away from getting engaged. But Kaitlyn is also not oblivious to the fact that the guys she is dating who are not named Nick might find that tryst to be a painful piece of information.

Two gentlemen who may fit that bill were JJ and Joe, who won the ignominious prize of getting to go on the two-on-one date together. (Side note: Can you imagine how amazing it would have been if Clint and JJ had been the two guys on the two-on-one? Has the Bachelorette ever been the third wheel on a date?) One person gets sent home on these dates, and here’s who it was this time around:

Joe did indeed later secure a rose. But one guy who did not yet have a rose was Shawn, who was still worried about his place on the show -- going so far as to call the show "a nightmare" -- even though Kaitlyn has gone out of her way to reassure him:

And as if Kaitlyn needed more secrets to worry about, it turns out that Ben H was around the night that Kaitlyn told Shawn that he was “The One.” He’s not exactly sure what she told Shawn that night, but he knows something changed, and the mild-mannered Ben confronts Kaitlyn about it here:

Kaitlyn’s biggest fear was that the other guys would find out that she slept with Nick, but now it turns out that validating Shawn has been a minefield as well, confirming that actions and words can prove equally tricky to navigate when you’re dating eight guys at once. (This, we do believe, is the primary takeaway from The Bachelor Franchise.)

When it comes time for the Rose Ceremony (remember those? Been a while!), Kaitlyn has to send two more guys home, and Ben Z and Tanner were the unlucky dudes this week. And then, it was off to Killarney for the next leg of their journey. That trip started with a one-on-one date of sorts, as one guy would be selected to accompany Kaitlyn on the drive while the other five guys ride in a bus that, if eliminated contestant Ian is to be trusted, will likely be filled with farts and sex jokes.

Jared won the honor of holding on for dear life as Kaitlyn ran over a few curbs at high speed while attempting to drive on the other side of the road. And no sooner does the gang arrive in Killarney than Chris Harrison pays Kaitlyn a visit -- and you know that means something’s up:

Chris straight-up told Kaitlyn she wasn’t ready to meet families yet. Aaaaand, she has to eliminate half the guys left! That means that as per usual, three guys will get the Fantasy Suite treatment, but Kaitlyn will only be going on TWO hometown dates. That is a pretty serious blow to what we’re sure was Kaitlyn’s unspoken desire to visit four totally random cities in America. You can’t put one over on Chris Harrison, Kaitlyn. Plan = foiled.

But that did mean that Kaitlyn had no time to waste in narrowing down the rest of the field. Chris “Cupcake” got a one-on-one date, as the pair was helicoptered (obviously) to a gorgeous coastline bluff near the Cliffs of Moher. Kaitlyn definitely felt the time crunch, because they’d barely gotten settled on the date when Kaitlyn started crying in the middle of it:

Chris was taking it pretty well, all things considered...until he wasn't. Before you watch the next clip, make sure you're willing to see a man at his most vulnerable moment, sobbing pretty damn hard. we almost didn't want to post this clip, but then we remembered, it's our job -- nay, responsibility -- to do so:

And that gut-wrenching moment marked the end of Cupcake’s run on the show. Before you start calling us monsters for posting this display of raw emotion on the Internet, Chris has had a sense of humor about this moment, posting on Twitter last night, "Hey Tanner do you have any more of those tissues you brought out of the limo?" So that's nice.

When we return next week, there will be five guys left, and two of them won’t survive the week. Hopefully Tanner has extra tissues.

Watch The Bachelorette, MONDAYS 8|7c on ABC.