Spoiler alert: Spoilers for The Summer I Turned Pretty Season 3, Episode 9 follow. It was the name heard ’round The Summer I Turned Pretty universe: Lacie Barone. Who is Lacie Barone? Steven (played by Sean Kaufman) asked Taylor the same question when he learned that Jeremiah cheated on Belly with Lacie when he was on spring break in Cabo. Yep. Finally, in Season 3, Episode 9 of The Summer I Turned Pretty, Taylor told Steven that his friend, who he’d been defending against Conrad for the last four years, cheated on his sister while on a beach vacation.
Considering everyone basically knew this already, it’s hard to believe Steven hadn’t yet heard the news. But alas, Taylor filled Steven in on Conrad and Belly’s Christmas together in Cousins, and how Jeremiah found out, broke up with Belly, and cheated on her in Cabo. In the show, Steven responds, “Jeremiah cheated on Belly? I have been cleaning up that guy’s tears for the past 24 hours and he cheated on my sister with Lacie Barone? Who the f*ck is Lacie Barone?” Taylor says, “Technically they were broken up, but yeah.” Steven continues, “Wow! Meanwhile, these f*ckers are out here passing judgment on us? We’re high-functioning, compared to them.”
The conversation then changes from Jeremiah and Belly to Steven and Taylor — who end up getting back together and trying the boyfriend/girlfriend thing out for real this time. But fans of the show weren’t exactly thrilled to see Belly’s older brother give a bare minimum reaction to some pretty big news that would probably change Steven’s feelings about Conrad entirely.
Sean Kaufman, the actor who plays Steven, gave insight into where his character’s head was at in an interview with Teen Vogue. For one, he agreed with fans. “I remember reading the scripts and getting to this point, and as Sean, I was a thousand percent expecting a full crashout [too]. I was ready. I was so ready for fists to be thrown and a fight to ensue and all this stuff,” he said. But, “I just think that it comes down to the timing of it all,” he said. “There was this looming [conversation] with Taylor, and it was important for me to remember reading [the script] that these people are not the main characters in Steven’s life. Taylor is, and that’s everything to him.”
Kaufman continued, “So when this thing happens to his best friend and his sister, he’s like, ‘This sounds so f*cking messy, and he hurt my sister, and I’m really upset and pissed, but the first thing on my mind is going to be the woman that I love and solving whatever the f*ck this is.’ And I’m excited for you guys to see how it continues to play out in the next couple episodes. But yeah, oh man, I am sorry to fans that were expecting a little more, but I think he always has Taylor at the forefront [of his mind].”
It makes sense. After all, Steven and Taylor were the stars of Episode 9, and since Belly and Jeremiah didn’t work out, it’s only right that there’s one couple experiencing some honeymoon bliss.