Jane the Virgin recap: 'Chapter 60'

Jane the Virgin fans! Did you miss the dramedy as much as I did the past few weeks? Sure you did, but fear not — our heroine extraordinaire is back with a bang, or at least that’s what her mind is on. (The show does have the revised title of Jane the Horndog this episode, after all.)

You’ll recall, when we last saw Jane, she’d set her sights on Rogelio’s very good-looking costar with a tendency to walk around shirtless, Fabian, and her crush has only intensified. The episode opens with the narrator saying, “Ah, lust. Jane Gloriana Villanueva would never forget the first time she felt it.” Then, we see a young Jane watching a steamy telenovela with a ripped actor calling after his beloved; soon, they start getting, um, frisky — all under a waterfall. So, quite the first-lust experience, and an awkward one too, since Xo and Alba were in the room with her. Everyone quickly fled to avoid talking about what they all just watched, but 20-something years later, things have certainly changed, which is to say the conversation is now very open.

In the present, Xo asks Jane about her crush on Fabian, something she came to figure out when Jane would find any reason to visit Rogelio on set — flash back to her doing just that and imaging Fabian with water falling over him. Jane’s very attracted to Fabian on a looks level, but she feels kind of insecure because he’s dated the likes of Gisele Bündchen’s twin. Xo says maybe he isn’t the type Jane usually dates, but why not a fling?

Jane, surprisingly, is open to the idea of casual sex with no strings because things are different; she waited until marriage, and now her circumstances have changed. That said, she still tries to keep quiet about it when Alba walks in the room, but Alba hears her anyway and says Jane’s decision is Jane’s decision. But it’s clear she’d like Jane to make what she would say is the right decision, which is no premarital sex. With that, the conversation soon turns to Alba and Jorge’s relationship, and it’s revealed that Alba hasn’t clued Jorge in on those beliefs (more on that later).

Later, at the Viajes de Guillermo set, Jane gets her flirt on by giving Fabian goji berries, which she discovered he’s a fan of after some very extensive research (shoutout to her search history). Rogelio sees them chatting it up, and when Xo clues him in on Jane’s crush, he’s having NONE. OF. IT. He believes he’s in an All About Eve situation, that Fabian is trying to push him out of the way to become the star after he seemingly body-shamed Rogelio when he went for a doughnut and made him feel incapable when he encouraged him to avoid doing his own stunts. So, Rogelio pulls Jane aside to confront her about her “unholy mega-crush on Fabian,” which Fabian overhears. Jane and Rogelio go somewhere more private, and Rogelio expresses that he doesn’t want Jane to get her heart broken, but the narrator wisely points out that he doesn’t think she’s thinking about her heart in this scenario. Jane says she’ll handle it and tells Fabian that she doesn’t have a crush on him, which is not true, but let’s pause that for a minute and turn to Jane’s book…

It’s finally ready to be published — huzzah! But the writing and editing process is only half of it. Now, Jane has to think about marketing, and that gets off to a rough start. The marketing team wants Jane to speak about her wild backstory to help with sales, but Jane wants to focus on her work — and her work alone. As a result, only 10,000 copies of her book have been ordered to sell. She asks her editor, Jeremy, if there’s any other way she can get into a local book fair, and he says a strong social media presence could do it. And by strong, he’s thinking 20k followers (yikes!). Jane’s in the single digits. She seeks the help of her Twitter mastermind father, but he’s unavailable at the moment. As Fabian tells her, Rogelio’s getting a massage after, ironically, injuring himself while doing a stunt. Jane explains her dilemma, and Fabian offers to help — and take her to coffee.

At coffee, the pair seem to really be getting on when all of a sudden, Fabian flips their table and yells about how he can’t believe she’s doing this after everything they’ve been through; he adds that she broke his heart and storms off, with the paparazzi there to catch it all. (Suspicious, right? Right.) Jane is understandably very confused, but Fabian later explains that he did that to help her get more followers, as his followers will hate follow her for, seemingly, breaking his heart. (So sweet, right? Right, but it’s not exactly the romantic gesture it was starting to appear to be.) Fabian asks if she’ll put in a good word with Rogelio since he helped her out; Rogelio is his hero, but he feels he keeps putting his foot in his mouth around him.

Jane does tell Rogelio about the help Fabian gave and relays how fond he is of Rogelio, so much so that it appears he’s only thinking about #Fabelio. Rogelio later speaks with Fabian about all this, and Fabian says he worships Rogelio and that the show would fall apart if he got hurt (ahh, so he wasn’t throwing shade with those stunt comments…). Fine, but Rogelio says no more using his daughter, to which Fabian responds that Jane said she doesn’t like him. Rogelio, with a laugh, gives him a reality check, and all seems well, until Fabian asks if Rogelio wants to get his nails done with him since their hands will be heavily featured on camera in an upcoming shoot. (More on that in a bit.)

Jane’s newfound followers don’t end up fixing her social media situation because most of them are from Latin America, so the marketing team expects many of them wouldn’t buy the book until it’s released in Spanish. But that won’t happen and it won’t be translated unless the book does well in its initial run in English. Jane turns to her mentor, Marlene, for guidance, and she advises Jane to “sell it with everything you got, because you don’t get a second debut novel.” And she would know from experience. She shows Jane a number of leftover copies of her novel and says there are a number more elsewhere. Jane heeds Marlene’s advice and calls Jeremy to tell him that her book can be marketed however he and the team deem appropriate, but on the condition that she gets into that book fair.

Jane gets in, and to reassure her, Xo tells her that the more she talks about Michael, the easier it will get. Alba, in a very touching moment, agrees that Xo is right. Jane’s afraid that Michael will become some sort of anecdote, and that’s when Alba recalls a time she was at the market about a year ago; her late husband’s favorite ice cream was on sale, and she was swept up in feelings of grief. “You’re in a long-term relationship with grief,” she explains. “But it has to evolve, and it’s okay to keep letting go. You have to.” So that’s what Jane does, telling moderator and author Maria Semple in a Q&A at the book fair about how she gave her relationship with Michael a happy ending through her writing. She also talks about how she had some hesitancy writing about her life because that makes you vulnerable. Fabian is there to hear her talk and is clearly very affected by her words — and also imagines her under a waterfall when she starts taking a sip from a water bottle — but doesn’t say anything to her at the time.

Jane’s kind of annoyed because he said he’d come, but nothing can really get her down because she had her first experience with a fangirl — and THREE WHOLE PEOPLE asked for her autograph. (What’s more, at the end of the episode we find out her book order has been upped by 5,000!) Then, Fabian knocks at her door and explains how he was nervous to talk to her and really related to what she had to say about putting yourself out there and being vulnerable. He gives her a copy of his book and asks her out on a date. (Don’t worry, he got permission from Rogelio.) She says yes, and they start making out, and soon, they’re both drenched in water — but that’s the result of the sprinklers going off, and isn’t some steamy fantasy sequence. Later, Jane looks at Fabian’s book, which is a collection of pictures of him looking F-I-N-E, and says to Alba and Xo that Alba might be waiting for marriage, but she and Fabian? Yeah, that’s going to happen.

Rogelio isn’t aware of the sex part — I’m sure he would have some feels about that — but he’s still having a hard time accepting Fabian as someone Jane’s dating. He tells Xo it’s hard to see Jane date someone new, and he knows that’s not fair. Even so, he doesn’t want to get mani-pedis with Fabian — flash back to Rogelio and Michael getting mani-pedis together. “Michael was my best friend. I really loved him, and I still think about him every single day,” he says through tears. (And I write through tears. I’ve been waiting a long time to see how Rogelio felt about Michael’s death, and even three years since his passing, this is still difficult to watch.) Rogelio says he doesn’t want to burden Jane, but Xo assures him that Fabian isn’t taking Michael’s place.

Now, let’s go back to Alba: Earlier in the episode she also had a waterfall fantasy, imagining Jorge under one after a kid shot him with his water gun. (By the way, this one has to be my favorite. The belt?! O.M.G.) When the room is clear, Jorge kisses Alba and suggests she sleep over — and that this time, they do a little less sleeping. How steamy! She finally tells him about her views on premarital sex. He’s surprised, so Alba says, “I think we’re done here,” which could be taken any number of ways. When Alba doesn’t hear from Jorge, she assumes that no sex means no relationship, but she’s wrong. At the Marbella store, he tells her that he thought she’d broken up with him and that he didn’t text because he doesn’t know how. And yes, he wasn’t expecting to hear that, but he cares about her, can handle no sex (because he’s not 62 anymore), and wants to see where things go.

In other relationship news, it’s become clear that Rafael is still interested in Petra. Petra is pulled aside by the cops again, who say they know she’s lying about where Anezka is. After being confronted, Petra ‘fesses up, but she says she’s only in contact to send Anezka money to keep her away; their contact has nothing to do with Scott. Still, they say Petra needs to get Anezka to come back for questioning, and if she doesn’t, they’ll charge her with obstructing a police investigation for lying — and for moving Scott’s bones. So, Anezka is coming into town. Rafael checks in on Petra, but Chuck butts in and says she’s fine; she doesn’t need to speak with her therapist because they’ve already talked it out. Rafael says talking about it now isn’t the same as being around when it happened, but Chuck retorts that it’s better that they live in the present anyway.

Soon, they have a fight that mimics one between Rogelio and Fabian’s telenovela characters, who are fighting over a woman they’re both interested in. That ends with Petra saying she appreciates the concern but can handle her sister. Chuck later asks Petra when they’re going to talk about Rafael’s feelings for her, which Petra seems oblivious to — c’mon girl, it’s obvious! And back to her sister: Can she really handle her? Petra starts to get worried when she hasn’t heard from Anezka when she was supposed to have landed. Then, she gets a call from Anezka from jail; the cops arrested her when she got off the flight. Anezka says Petra better fix this or she’ll start spilling all the dirt she has on her twin.

Chuck’s not the only one Rafael’s at war with. When his sister Luisa and girlfriend Eileen (who’s actually Rose in disguise, but let’s refer to her as Eileen when she’s in disguise) plan to come to town, Rafael enlists the help of the seemingly shady Elvis. Turns out Elvis isn’t actually shady but is instead a private eye whom Rafael has asked to bug Luisa and Eileen’s room in case there’s any word about Rose. “My family will never feel completely safe until Rose is locked up for good,” Rafael says, and his suspicions are worthwhile because, again, Eileen is Rose in disguise. When Luisa and Eileen arrive, Luisa says she hopes to meet Rafael’s kids one day — she’s not allowed to because, you know, her relationship with Rose — and Eileen asks about the cops hanging around the hotel. Rafael says they’re looking into Scott’s death because it doesn’t appear to be an accident anymore.

Naturally, Luisa confronts Eileen to see if she had something to do with it. She says she didn’t — and it looks like she’s telling the truth, but you never know with her — but Eileen is now paranoid and wants to switch rooms in case there’s a wire. Switch, they do, so Rafael and Elvis come up with a plan B. Rafael will turn off the air conditioner so Elvis can go in as a repairman and insert a bug. Eileen is S-U-S-P-I-C-I-O-U-S, and her suspicions grow even more when Rafael texts to make sure they’re both still meeting him.

Eileen says she’s not leaving the room unattended and has Luisa make up some excuse for her absence. Rafael tells Elvis the coast is clear upon hearing the excuse, but Eileen is, in fact, inside — and takes off her mask to reveal the Rose within just as Elvis approaches the room. She hears the door opening and quickly lifts her shirt over her head to conceal her true identity, yelling at Elvis to get out. Later, Rose says they need to leave, but Luisa doesn’t want to because she’s finally breaking through with Rafael and might meet his kids. Rose says she’s leaving and asks if Luisa is coming. TBD on that, but it looks like she might be staying.

Drama, drama, drama for days! I’d expect nothing less from Jane, but what did you think? What are your predictions for the rest of the season? Let me know at @cmollysmith. And finally, some other gems from the week…

Honorable Mentions:

• Rogelio passing the baton that is his marker to Jane when her first fan asks for an autograph
• Jane practicing her very unnatural, forced pitch for the marketing team in her car
• #telemundoandchill
• Jane’s poster of Fabian that she’s holding when he shows up at her house
• Rogelio’s love for Michael again, because it’s THAT moving. (Don’t act like you didn’t blubber too.)