Sometimes love isn't enough — or is it? The Sunday, Nov. 22, episode of The Real Housewives of Atlanta focused largely on Cynthia Bailey's unraveling marriage and her struggle to decide whether it was something she wanted to try to stitch back together at all. As she tried to make heads and tails of her situation, the Bailey Agency founder ended up confiding in someone you might not expect.
Cynthia's Ex Schools Her on Her Marriage
Since her daughter, Noelle, had decided to pursue her singing and acting career more aggressively, Cynthia thought it made sense to homeschool her. The only problem? Finding a teacher. (Apparently, Cynthia had no intention of teaching Noelle herself.) The former model invited Noelle's father, Leon, over to help interview the candidates — but soon after his arrival the conversation turned from their daughter to her marriage to Peter Thomas.
"Peter and I definitely have been having some issues," Cynthia admitted. "It's finally gotten to a point now where I just really, honestly, pretty much checked out on the situation."
But Leon wasn't letting her off that easily. "You know, better than I, that you've walked away from more relationships than you've stayed in," he pointed out. "This relationship is a little different because this time you got married." For her part, Cynthia admitted "the truth hurts," but insisted it wasn't like she was Elizabeth Taylor, who was married eight times.
"If you exhaust every other option and it's not working for you, and it's not working for him, then that's when you part ways, but I think it's worth fighting for," Leon continued. "If you fight for it and you don't win the fight, then you're right. You walk away."
It seemed like the father of her child really made an impact, as Cynthia later told the camera, "The fact that he thinks I should fight for my marriage really speaks volumes. It really makes me want to reevaluate the situation."
Kandi Tries to Talk Sense Into Porsha — Again
Meanwhile, Porsha Williams invited Kandi Burruss to watch her participate in a charity run (which seemed more like a charity jog). After Porsha was done, she and Kandi had a chat, but unlike Cynthia's talk with Leon, this one seemed less effective.
In an attempt to get Kandi on her side when it came to her hot-and-heavy relationship with her much-younger football-player boyfriend, Duke, Porsha said, "You know what it was like when you first started dating Todd Tucker." Kandi bit her tongue on that one, instead keeping the focus on Porsha's newfound love.
"When I first met you, you were in a marriage where we said things you thought we shouldn't have said, but then at the end, you were like, 'You guys were right about a lot of things,'" Kandi pointed out. "Going forward, you just need to be aware and not afraid to just ask."
Porsha insisted that her relationship was "good" and that when it wasn't good anymore, she'd bail, but Kandi barely avoided rolling her eyes right in Porsha's face.
Hot in Here
Emboldened by the success of Cynthia's eyewear launch, Kenya Moore threw a party of her own to celebrate Kenya Moore Haircare. The party was hot, literally. Thanks to a lack of adequate air-conditioning, guests — who included fellow Housewives Kim Fields, Sheree Whitfield, Phaedra Parks, and Kandi — were sweltering. To make matters worse, there was no water available at the bar … but the sample product bottles were filled with the stuff. When guests figured that out, they began to swig from the product bottles in delight. Yikes.
Of course Sheree, who had gotten into it with Kenya during Cynthia's party, couldn't help but throw some shade. "I'm not totally sure I can really trust Kenya," she quipped. "I mean, she still wears colored contacts in 2015." Sheree went on to note, "Kenya had a haircare event with no haircare products."
But Kenya wasn't blind to the disaster before her. "This is not the Kenya Moore experience that I want my guests to enjoy," the hostess admitted, calling her party a "hot ass mess." She tried to turn the party around by making a short speech acknowledging the heat, but that didn't seem to do it.
At least she and Sheree got a minute to bury the hatchet about their previous brawl. For her part, Kenya insisted that she didn't personally have a problem with Sheree's stalled construction and had merely been repeating what neighbors had said. (Yeah, right.) "From now on you come straight to me and I'll come straight to you," Sheree told Kenya, who agreed. Still, Sheree told the camera, "I can let bygones be bygones, but I still know that the bitch is sneaky."
Cynthia Faces Peter
Later, a calmer (and perhaps sadder) Cynthia admitted that she and Peter hadn't had any communication for 10 full days. "It doesn't feel good to come home to an empty bed night after night," she lamented before finally coming face-to-face with her significant other.
Though it was clear that their wounds were still raw, both Peter and Cynthia seemed to want to talk things out. "I felt like you acted completely inappropriately at the party," Cynthia told her husband, who admitted he was "inebriated" when he arrived at the eyewear event where he'd argued with her friends.
Peter seemed to think that their troubles stemmed from putting work ahead of their marriage, while Cynthia focused on a more general "disconnect" between them. Cynthia couldn't help but point out, however, that Peter was the one who decided to open a bar in Charlotte, far from where they lived. He didn't like that so much.
"It's not my fault!" he screamed, prompting her to scream back, "Nobody's saying it's your fault!" After accusing Cynthia of being unable to "balance" her obligations, he asked her when she stopped loving him.
"I don't know," she said honestly. "It's been a lot of different things. Sometimes I don't even feel like we are compatible."
Peter, who was on the brink of tears, replied, "I never stopped being in love with you." It seemed that this moment softened Cynthia, who suggested they give it one more go.
"I'm going to do everything I can. I am. I promise you," Peter said.
Cynthia was clearly proceeding with caution, noting, "If it's not working, we're not going to be together. We're going to go our separate ways."
Tell Us: Do you think Cynthia and Peter's marriage will last?
