The latest episode of Freeform’s Cruel Summer, aptly titled “Proof,” was a big one for everyone. Jeannette gets a breakthrough for her lawsuit case, Ben opens up to a classmate, Jamie is just a hot mess, and Mr. Harris tries to keep it cool when asked about Kate at school. Here’s what went down on approximately August 30th, 1993, 1994, and 1995.
Silver Bullet | With some unintentional snooping on Derek’s (Barrett Carnahan) part (1995), he finds major, incriminating evidence on Ashley’s (Ashlei Sharpe Chestnut) computer, which he prints out and gives to his sister Jeannette (Chiara Aurelia). The text on that printout, from the private online chat that Kate (Olivia Holt) has been frequenting for emotional support, reveals that she went to Martin Harris’s house willingly. “This is not the narrative that [Kate] presented on the record,” Jeannette’s lawyer says. “It’s a glaring inconsistency.” “Kate won’t contribute to the narrative that paints her to be anything less than a saint,” Jeannette adds, “when in reality, she’s a huge liar. And now we have proof.”
Trouble in Paradise | It’s Jeannette’s first day back at school with her braces finally off! Mallory finds that Jeannette is still holding onto Kate’s scrunchy that she got from Mr. Harris at the fair. Jeannette tells Mal that she’s just trying to remember to give it back. “That’s what you said when you wore it to the mall, and to the movies, and to the roller rink, as if we’d run into Kate Wallis.” We start to see the fracture in their friendship.
In the lunch yard, Jamie (Froy Gutierrez) notices that Kate is not there. His gang of friends suggest that maybe she’s sick or at home doing next week’s homework. He explains to them that he made her late to her birthday celebration at her house the night before, when he got pissed drunk and passed out on Mr. Harris’s yard. “I hope she’s not mad at me,” Jamie says.
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Candid Camera | There’s just one item left on the list of summer things to do for Kate, Mallory (Harley Quinn Smith), and Vince (Allius Barnes) — a prank tape that will be broadcast schoolwide instead of the morning announcements. The video includes toilet paper hanging off of Mrs. Robb’s shoes, and even one of Mr. Harris at his house, getting soaked from his sprinklers. “If we pull this off, we could be legends,” Vince says.
Mallory assigns Jeannete and Vince as lookouts as she heads to the AV room to wait for class to start to play the tape. Unfortunately, both Jeannette and Vince get distracted, leaving Mal without a lookout when the time comes to play the tape. With Mal’s partners in crime abandoning their posts, Mr. Harris catches her in the act. “It’s a prank,” she tells him. “It’s a video of all our favorite teachers doing silly things. It’s harmless.” When Mr. Harris spots himself in the tape, he becomes furious, demanding she stop the tape, and gives her detention.
Runaways | With Kate fleeing the house and nowhere to be found, Joy Wallis (Andrea Anders) heads to Skylin High and into Mr. Harris’s office to ask if she’s at school. She confides in Martin because he’s been around the family long enough to know that they like to deal with situations privately. “I need someone inside the fold,” she tells him, “which is why I came to you.” He makes a call and lets Joy know that of the two absences in the school, Kate is one of them.
She says that her daughter stormed out of the house and she never came back. “She’s running away to prove a point,” she tells him. “I ran away to a friend’s house a dozen times when I was her age,” Joy reveals to him. She wants to bring in the police, but Mr. Harris puts a stop to that idea real fast. “That would be the antithesis of doing things quietly,” he tells her. “I wouldn’t want [the police] to confuse [her running away] with negligence, which obviously you and I know it’s not the case.” “This is why I came to you first,” she tells him. She feels confident that she’ll come home. “I’m sure of it.”
Two of a Kind | “Your mom died, right?” Wow, Vince. What a way to start a conversation! The reason Vince (Allius Barnes) left his post was because Ben (Nathaniel Ashton) had run into him in the hallway. What the two have in common is that they both have lost their mothers. Ben offers to chat about it with him in the gymnasium. Hot guy in the hallway who wants to talk, or watching to see if any faculty will walk into the AV room. It’s a no brainer. Ben reveals to him that his mother had died of cancer when he was just 13. Vince says he lost his mother in a car accident. “I always try to remember those few hours when she was gone,” Vince says, “when I didn’t know my world was upside down yet.”
Ben says that there had been something that he had always wanted to be brave enough to tell his mother, but he chickened out. “I told her that I loved her, and that was it.” Vince asks what was the thing he chickened out about. Without saying a word, Vince understood, as Ben reached over and interlocked their pinky fingers. It was at that moment Vince realized they had another thing in common.
Crash | Jamie is going through a lot right now, and drowns his sorrows in booze, lots and lots of booze. His drinking is starting to get out of control. Who can forget when he passed out on Mr. Harris’s yard (how did he get home after that?)? When Ben asks for a ride to the field (1994), they get into a major, life-changing car accident that leaves Ben’s shoulder all bloody and torn up. At the scene of the accident, Vince runs to his boo and offers to ride in the ambulance with him to the hospital, which Ben, worried about being outed, rejects. In 1995 we see Ben struggling to lift his weights. As an athlete, this car crash has definitely altered his life.
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Snow Globe | Jeannette meets Jamie in his garage, where he lets a load off his shoulders. He feels such guilt for punching her the year before, and for being the reason why his best friend’s life will never be the same. Jeannette spots a tape recorder in Jamie’s garage and asks what it is. He says that it’s a message left to him on Christmas Eve, months after Kate was kidnapped. “It’s just a bunch of random sounds,” he tells her. “I thought might have something to do with Kate.”
Jeannette asks to hear the tape and when Jamie presses play, they hear the sound of someone breathing deeply while a musical chime and an old movie plays in the background. Jeannette recognizes that chime immediately, and runs to Mallory’s house. She tells her former friend that she hates to ask for favors and that she wants to see the snow globe that she had given her. Mal says she no longer has it and even questions why she should still have it. After Jeannette gives up and leaves, Mallory goes to her room, reaches under her bed, and pulls out the snow globe. Is Mallory involved in Kate’s disappearance? Was Kate sending Jamie a clue with that voicemail? And if that was Mallory’s snow globe heard in the voice message, how was Kate in possession of it, and how was it returned to Mal?
Ejected | When Mr. Harris caught Mallory in the AV room, he was, rightfully so, in a panic. He didn’t know that Mallory was filming him that morning as his sprinklers turned. He watched his “prank” over and over to see if anything out of the ordinary could be seen. Sure enough, as he walks away from his front door and across his yard, the figure of Kate can be seen looking out the window. Alarmed by this, he ejects the tape and destroys it to pieces. We’re hoping Mallory made a copy of that tape.
What are your thoughts on this crazy episode? Does this confirm (as social media has been speculating) that Mallory is somehow involved? Does Kate looking out the window show that she was not yet imprisoned by Mr. Harris? Did he then lock her in the basement when Kate decided it was time to go home? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!
Cruel Summer airs Tuesdays at 10pm on Freeform.