California Dreams

At Whit's End, Buck is happily rewatching a video of Jules's latest performance with the Westcotts, sure that the song she wrote is her best yet. Jules is less thrilled. All she can see is her frizzy hair, and a snarky comment under the video stings her badly. She has an image to think about, she insists, especially if she is going to become a pop star someday. Then she drops a bombshell: she has already called that morning and quit the group, even though a show is only two weeks away. Buck is stunned and accuses her of becoming selfish and shallow, reminding her that she once said her songs mattered less than her friends. The argument turns ugly, with Jules sneering that Odyssey is a backward little town that fits Buck perfectly. "If the overalls fit," she jabs, and Buck fires back that he would rather be a hick than self-centered. Jules storms out.

At home, Connie gently suggests that Buck may have a point, since Jules poses and polishes every photo she posts and even avoids the church worship team because of what people might think of her. Before they can finish talking, the doorbell rings. It is Jules's mother, Jan Kendall, arriving out of the blue with startling news: she has come to take Jules home to California. Connie asks for a few days so Jules can say goodbye, but Jules, still smarting from the fight, decides this is the perfect time to leave. She asks Connie to pass along her goodbyes to Whit, Jillian, Penny, and the others, but not to Buck; their friendship, she says, had run its course anyway.

In Los Angeles, Jules learns why her mother seems so unusually cheerful: Jan is engaged. Her fiancé is a man with the unlikely name of Coyote, Kai for short, who greets Jules warmly at the airport and insists he will not set a wedding date until Jules feels comfortable. He wants her to trust him, he says, because "this is a forever thing." Jules is wary, since she and her mother have never been close, but when Jan admits it was Kai who insisted the whole family be together, Jules begins to think he might be an okay guy.

Back in Odyssey, Buck is hurt to learn Jules left without a word. Connie urges him to call, but when he does, Jules sees his name and lets it ring to voicemail while she and her mother pick out paint colors. Buck hangs up without leaving a message, convinced she is avoiding him and that maybe a fashion-loving city girl and a country boy who likes fishing never made sense as friends in the first place.

After a fun family dinner out, Kai overhears Jules singing a song she wrote, called I'm Just Me, in the kitchen. He is genuinely impressed, and he reveals that finding talent is his job: he is a talent scout, and he wants to take Jules on as a client. Soon she is recording in a real studio, though the producers rework her heartfelt song into a slick pop number that barely resembles what she wrote. When she hesitates, Kai warns her that singers who start with ballads get forgotten, and promises she can do her own style later, once she builds a fan base. In this business, he tells her, "it's go hard or go home." Jules decides to trust him.

Things move fast. A bubbly publicist named Trista arrives to give Jules a signature look that is "beyond fashion": a vest made of soda can tabs, furry boots shaped like elephant feet, and tire tread pants, all to fit a rebel granola-girl brand. Jules protests that none of it is really her, but the objections get harder to make when exciting news arrives: a band has dropped out sick, and Trista can get Jules a spot opening for the opener of the opener at a concert headlined by Jet Ballantyne, the chart-topping star Jules adores. Swept along, Jules even accepts that her own songs are being cut from her set in favor of songs picked to match her brand. Then Trista mentions one more thing Jules should know about Jet Ballantyne: "You're dating him." Jules can only sputter a shocked "What?" as the story ends, leaving her fate, and her real self, hanging in the balance.