Chad coaxes the truth out of Thomas — namely that of being hurt to find out his dad was lying about Cat! That’s perfect timing, because the

couple just decided it was time to share they have feelings for each other. Chad’s confused about why Thomas is even mad since he likes Cat and was fine with Stephanie.

“That’s because Stephanie wasn’t hiding at Nono’s house pretending to be mom!” Right, well, that’s a decent reason. The kid puts together that this is why grandma and grandpa can’t forgive her, but doesn’t get why Chad would.

Cat meets with Rafe to go over Gwen’s blackout revelation at lunch. “There’s definitely something going on,” Rafe notes. And this is why he’s making the big bucks back in the FBI.

They figure Gwen’s mixed up in whatever EJ’s doing, so Rafe tells Cat to push EJ to give her a tour of the construction site. He notes though, that she’s clearly distracted with all the phone checking she’s been doing. Cat cops to it and tells him all about her and Chad. “Oh! OK…”

Jennifer Really Hates Cat
Steve and Kayla go over the Tesoro test results — she’s sure there was no error, but hey, this is Salem, so she’ll run the test again. But then Jen drops into the Pub to surprise them, ready for the Horton interviews.

Oh, and she’s so excited to see Jeremy, since he’s back in Salem! “Huh,” Kayla grunts. (Is everyone but the Johnsons oblivious to what he did??) They do the interview — mostly offscreen — then Jen launches right into griping about Chad and Cat. And Mark Greene’s parole.

Kayla and Steve try defending Cat, but that just sets Jen off all over again. Kayla gives a beautiful speech about forgiveness, letting go of anger and forgiving Steve, Jack and even Abigail, but Jennifer just does not want to see any parallels.

Has Jeremy Really Changed?
Picking up from Friday, Jeremy (played by Michael Roark) shows up on Steph’s doorstep with flowers. Julie gave him the address (good job, Julie), and yes, the “stalker” was him in town for a job interview. Despite Stephanie’s best efforts, Jeremy pleads his way in, asking for just a few minutes.

He starts with congratulating her for being Anastasia Sands, moves on to admitting he’s full of regrets for how he treated her, and says he figured she’d hear he was back in town. So he wanted to assure her he’ll leave her alone and she’s got nothing to worry about. By, er, following her around for a week to tell her.

It turns out, most people don’t know what he did to her. Even Stephanie’s parents know just a few things. (OK, we’ll forgive Julie a bit for ratting Steph out.) She knew he’d turned his life around, but she wasn’t protecting him, just ashamed of herself.

Jeremy, to his credit, takes all the blame and apologizes. He wanted to look her in the eye to do it. Trauma be damned! But he also promises to keep her Anastasia secret.

Stephanie helpfully points out that him being a teacher is absurd because he was on the run with a criminal record. Turns out, he got that all worked out with the cops. And went to therapy and went back to school! Easy peasy.

So he came back to Salem hoping Stephanie would give him a chance to prove he’s a changed man and — wait a minute. That’s the exact opposite of promising to keep out of her way! Stephanie’s confused, upset look as she closes the door is probably on all our faces, too.

In the Show’s Final Moments
Jennifer gets back to the Horton house just in time for Thomas to scream at his dad, tell him he never wants to see him again and run into her arms. Well… there goes Kayla’s speech — especially when Thomas blurts out the dating thing in a fury. Jen, of course, just shakes her head like Chad’s a child, then lectures him when Thomas runs off, pretty much calling him a horrible dad for getting involved with Cat.