In a new preview clip from Sunday’s opening episode from Season 18 of Sister Wives, Kody and Christine Brown meet in person for the first time since calling it quits on their marriage.
The conclusion of Season 17 saw Christine pack her bags and move back to Utah after successfully selling her Flagstaff home.
Christine finally threw in the towel after 27 years of plural marriage and gave Kody the boot after feeling undermined and ignored.
Now, we get to see Christine and Kody interact for the first time as official former spouses in a teaser from Sunday’s premiere on TLC.
In the clip, Kody and Christine meet up for lunch to discuss their plans for Christmas.
Admittedly, Kody feels “uncomfortable” during their meet-up and confesses that he feels “betrayed” after Christine “s**t-talked” him to their kids.
“I kind of feel like, in my heart, I just never want to see her again,” Kody tells TLC producers during a solo confessional. “And I want to spend some time hating her.”
Kody and Christine Brown discuss spending Christmas apart at their first face-to-face meetup during Sister Wives Season 18 Episode 1
In true Kody fashion, he begins their conversation by questioning Christine about being tested for COVID-19 before coming back to Flagstaff to visit the family.
Christine is shocked to hear that Kody wants her to be tested since he’s already battled the virus, but he claims it’s because his and Robyn’s daughter, Aurora, is the only one in their family who hadn’t yet contracted it.
After Christine admits that she had forgotten how concerned he is about COVID-19, Kody gives her very explicit instructions on when and how to be tested before seeing any of the family members.
Christine plans to leave Truely at Robyn’s house while she hangs out with Janelle and her kids at her rental home for Christmas — and who can blame her?
“I’m not going to go to Robyn’s, no,” Christine admits. “No, it’s… no. Why?”
That’s when Robyn enters the clip, admitting that Janelle spending Christmas apart from the rest of the family “broke her heart.”
“I was very sad to hear it,” Robyn declares.
Somehow, the topic of the entire segment turns to COVID-19 at this point. Christine mocks Kody for acting “out of his mind” while he battled COVID-19, but he doesn’t find it very funny.
Kody fails to find the humor in Christine’s jokes about him contracting COVID-19
“You’re mean that way,” Kody sarcastically tells Christine. “It’s okay.”
Christine tries to make light of the topic and encourages Kody to laugh about it rather than continue to mope.
“What are you going to do?” says Christine. “You can either laugh about things or cry about things and if you can’t look back with a sense of humor, what a waste.”
However, Kody fails to find any humor in Christine’s remarks or her actions, for that matter.
“Oh, I’m not laughing here. I haven’t been laughing with her leaving. I’ve never been laughing about this thing,” Kody tells cameras during his confessional.
“She asked me to stop staying at her place… I wasn’t laughing then,” he continues. “She moved my stuff into the garage… I wasn’t laughing then. She left with Truely, and she left early… I wasn’t laughing then. I’ve never been laughing about this.”
Clearly, Kody has taken his and Christine’s split very seriously, but Christine seems to have found a way to downplay the seriousness of it all.
Season 18 of Sister Wives premieres on Sunday, August 20, at 10/9c on TLC and Discovery+.