And Just Like That… Season 3, Episode 9: The Shocking twist that’s got EVERYONE talking – Did we just witness a deja vu disaster?
New York is so back, baby. And Just Like That’s third season is in full swing, and Harper’s Bazaar will be recapping new episodes every Thursday. Read ahead to find out what happened this week, or click here to read last week’s recap.
So … that’s how we’re ending that? Nine episodes into the third season of And Just Like That and Carrie and Aidan’s relationship ends over some untouched iced tea and a conversation about semantics?
Clocking in under 30 minutes long, “Present Tense” is the shortest episode of the season. No need to drag this out any longer, I suppose. The breakup felt rushed and disorienting—in the same way, I guess, that real-life breakups often feel. One moment you’re having phone sex thousands of miles apart and the next you’re screaming at each other in the middle of brunch at Tartine.
The beginning of the end finally came when Aidan sat down to talk with Duncan. The sight ambushed Carrie, who explicitly forbade Aidan from socializing with Duncan, but the graver offense was how Aidan treated him. It was a dick-off, of sorts. Aidan seems to think he can get away with saying anything if he hides it behind his genteel country boy charm, but Duncan’s no idiot. He can sense when he’s being hazed. Through this conversation, we learn something new about the English biographer: he is divorced and he has no kids. These facts irk Aidan, in the way a lot of child-saddled parents are offended by the existence of childless adults. But, I think Aidan is less concerned with Duncan’s obligation to reproduce than he is with how easily Duncan’s lifestyle assimilates into Carrie’s. He can’t say the same for himself.
Of course, it takes two to tango—and two to push this rotting relationship past the point of no return. Should Aidan have gone out of his way to meet Duncan despite Carrie’s opposition? Probably not. But should Carrie also not act so weird about Aidan meeting their downstairs neighbor/her work-from-home buddy? Obviously yes. She’s self-aware enough to admit to Seema that she knows she is the problem—or, more specifically, her past sins are. But rather than sitting down and having an honest conversation about the past—about what it means to restore trust with a partner you cheated on—she somehow comes to the conclusion that Aidan’s jealous tantrums are just “a blip.” For all of the dating and relationship experience she has under her belt, Carrie is still afraid of facing hard conversations head on. It’s a terrible mindset to have because, as anyone in a long-term relationship knows, the hard conversations will come whether you want them to or not.
Carrie finally reaches her boiling point when, later that night, Aidan interrupts her writing session with Duncan. In his defense, he knocks on Duncan’s door with a fairly innocuous question: when are you coming home so I can start cooking dinner? But, while Aidan might be talking about steaks, Carrie and the rest of us can read between the lines. I can recognize Aidan’s desperation for assurance, thinly veiled under a veneer that pretends to be anything but. He longs to feel connected with Carrie, but he, too, is dancing the same dance she is, tiptoeing around the words that really need to be said. Instead of letting her in on the fears he has about their relationship, he pushes her to give him a time that she expects to be back up. She can’t.
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