Gabby Windey and Rachel Recchia are playing by their own rules.
One of the biggest questions about The Bachelorette's two-lead season has finally been answered. One week after Gabby Windey and Rachel Recchia hosted their first rose ceremony, the plan for the remaining elimination events has finally been revealed.
Since the franchise's first-ever two-lead season was announced, fans wondered who would pick which guys stayed in the house. Would Rachel and Gabby hand out joint roses? Could guys get two roses a week, one from each lady? Would the men have the option to reject one woman's rose in favor of the other's?
Ahead of the season's inaugural rose ceremony, host Jesse Palmer told the men, "Rachel and Gabby, they’ve both informed me that the roses they hand out tonight, they’re coming from both women. It means that both Gabby and Rachel, they want you around."
Gabby reiterated Jesse's statement, telling the guys, "Receiving a rose tonight means that both Rachel and I both would like to invite you into next week."
With that, Gabby and Rachel, standing on either side of a rose-filled table, alternated in calling guys' names, and all the men accepted the rose they were offered.
Going forward, though, things are going to be different. In the season preview, viewers were shown a totally different rose ceremony setup, with Gabby and Rachel standing on opposite sides of the room, with their own table of roses next to them.
In the preview, as Rachel offered several men a rose, they each turned her down, telling her that they were there for Gabby.
"It seems cruel for both of us to be put in this place together," Rachel says in the preview. "I don’t know how I’m supposed to fall in love when no one gives a s**t about me. This is not supposed to be like this."
Gabby will face the same problem, as one guy tells her that his intentions are "fully for Rachel."
"He said he can’t love me. Am I not good enough? Am I too broken for anyone to love?" Gabby questions, before another man tells her that he still has feelings "on the other side," leading her to ask, "Why? Why me? Why now?"
That all started to play out on episode 3 of the series, when Gabby and Rachel decided to embark on separate journeys and make the men pick which woman they want to pursue.
Ahead of rose ceremony No. 2, Jesse told the guys that, by accepting a rose from one woman they "are committing to dating one woman, that woman... and not the other."
The plan appeared to be sound, but things turned awkward when three men rejected Rachel's rose, and declared that they were on the show for Gabby.
After the rejections, Rachel was not allowed to offer the rose to someone else, and instead lost the rose altogether. As for the men, they returned to the stage, hoping to hear their name called by Gabby, though that wish was in vain for all three guys.
Going forward, Rachel and Gabby will continue to hand out individual roses as they search for their future husband.
When ET spoke to Jesse ahead of the season, he teased that, throughout the season, "a lot of things are going to happen that have never happened before."
"I think in certain moments [they will] really veer off course and do things their own way," he added. "There’s no set formula. There are no rules. I think that’s something that Bachelor Nation and fans at home are going to see."
As for when the guys have to decide which woman they want to pursue, Jesse said, "There's no real clear defined answer for all of us -- myself included, producers included -- as we were kinda navigating through this season."
Rachel, meanwhile, told ET that the journey is "a struggle, but it’s worth it."
"We knew going in it was going to be a mutual decision. Me and Gabby can pick whoever we want, but it needs to be a [mutual] decision," Rachel added. "... They could've gone in thinking they were going to connect with one and then connect with the other, so we just wanted to be open to exploring all the connections."
Gabby agreed, telling ET, "Both of our journeys are going to be very different, the way we love people is different, the way we are is just different, so I feel like it is just going to be kind of two separate journeys. I think it will be fun for people to watch."
The Bachelorette airs Mondays on ABC. Keep up with the historic season by following along with ET's coverage of the series.
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