BWW Recap: Absence Makes the Heart Grow...Crazy? on BATES MOTEL

It won't be long before we've lost Norman to his "Norma" counterpart, and this week's episode of BATES MOTEL sped the process! Picking up in the high tension state of the previous episode, Norman grows violent in the kitchen when he realizes his mother has left and is not coming back. She couldn't stand the thought of her brother and rapist, Caleb, staying in town, and fled home as a result. He begins breaking plates and throwing silverware, and Dylan tries to calm him down to no avail. Dylan decides to tell Caleb he needs to leave town in order for Norma to return by her own free will.

The Bates home isn't the only violent area in White Pine Bay that evening; in the parking lot of a supermarket, Romero is shot in a drive-by assault by a random stranger. He wakes up in a hospital bed and begs his nurse to bring him his phone. He frantically calls Norma to tell her he was shot and she could be in danger herself.

He receives an unexpected visitor while in a recovery- the man who wants to snag his job. The man promises keep Romero safe from Paris and his men if he could teach him the ins and outs of White Pine Bay. Romero tells him he needs time to mull over his offer. But when the man goes to his car to leave the hospital, Romero appears out of thin air and shoots him in the head. The sheriff drives his car out of the parking garage covered in a blood-stained hospital gown.

Meanwhile, Norma checks into a motel for the night. She heads into a bar to take her mind off of her brother. She meets a man named Taylor and the two hit it off, but Norma's version of flirting involves telling a jumble of little white lies leading to a completely fabricated life. The two begin making out in Taylor's car, but Norma scrambles when Taylor tries to take things further. She shoves him off of her and runs out of the car, leaving him screaming after her. Norma decides to call her professor for help, for she fears she's having some sort of a breakdown.

Norma stumbles into the professor's house drunk and highly emotional. She ends up sharing her darkest secret with him; Norman's dangerous blackouts led to the death of her husband. The professor (and therapist) comforts her, and the two begin to kiss on his couch. Norma ends up spending the night with him.

Back at the Bates house, Norman isn't taking his mother's absence well. He enters a dreamlike state, chanting "I want my mother. I love my mother"- yes, it's just as creepy as you're imagining. Dylan and Emma try to keep an eye on him.

When Dylan ventures downstairs in the middle of the night, he finds Norman is in the kitchen in a feminine robe cooking "breakfast". But he isn't Norman at all- he begins speaking, walking, and acting as his mother! This is the first time we're seeing Norman really encompass his mother rather than speaking to a hallucination of her, and I nearly passed out from fright. Freddie Highmore does an excellent job of mastering Vera Farmiga mannerisms as Norma, and it only adds to the eeriness of the scene.

Norma arrives back at the Bates home the next morning. She orders Dylan and Norman to get into the car, for she is ready to confront Caleb. The three drive to Caleb's house and Norma stomps Caleb's front door. He collapses at her knees, and repeatedly apologizes for his wrongdoings. But Norman doesn't seem happy for his mother's closure; after all, Caleb could potentially take away his mother again.

Keep tuning in to Bates Motel Monday nights at 9pm EST on A&E!

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