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Ariana Madix revealed a cringy gift Tom Sandoval gave to Rachel “Raquel” Leviss amid her stint in treatment after the airing of the premiere episode of Vanderpump Rules on Tuesday.
As Sandoval, 41, explained the real reason he refused to move out of their $2 million home and accused her of being “performative” with her anger, Ariana, 38, shared what her ex gifted his former mistress while also suspecting her former co-star, Billie Lee, 39, was living in their home.
“We don’t have separate mailboxes so I’m not like going through stuff but something comes and you’re like ‘Is that for me? Oh no, it’s coming from somewhere in Arizona,’” Ariana began on the January 30 episode of the Pump Rules: After Show.
Because Sandoval and Raquel, 29, remained in touch throughout her time in treatment, Ariana often came across their correspondence — while also learning new details in regard to their sordid affair from those previously close to her ex.
“People who used to be friends with him … started sending me all kinds of like info and text messages and pictures of them in St. Louis and all this stuff because they were like ‘I’m not friends with him anymore. I f*cking hate him so here’s everything that I know,’” she shared.
According to Ariana, she suspects Raquel was sending things to their house because she didn’t realize she was a co-owner of her and Sandoval’s home.
“There’s one thing that I saw, I’m struggling to talk about it because it’s so cringe, I think it was like after she stopped wanting to talk to him or something. He got one of those lamps that like, I have one and you have one and it’s like Bluetooth or something so it’s like if I go touch it where I am, it’ll turn on where you are,” Ariana described, adding, “Oh my god, I can’t.”
Although Sandoval said he was “careful” to keep his packages to Raquel hidden, he confirmed they were “definitely” communicating in the weeks leading up to filming on Pump Rules season 11.
“We’d send each other letters and stuff like that,” he explained. “[Her lightning bolt] postcard was sent like a month before. I don’t know what she was thinking sending that to my address. She’s like, ‘I don’t know what I was thinking. It was my first time out.’ She had left the facility, they had gone out somewhere and she got a postcard, and I was like ‘I can’t find it.’”
In addition to revealing he sent Raquel “candy” and saying he “learned how to write and stamp wax” and would “put sparkles” in envelopes, Sandoval confirmed his cringy gift to his ex.
“I sent her one of these lights where like if I turn it a certain color, it changes, like we can communicate with these lights. I was very much in love,” he admitted.
During another segment of the After Show, Ariana and Sandoval’s living arrangements were discussed.
“[I didn’t move out] because all those bills will be coming out of my accounts. I knew that if I moved out, she would probably have a friend move in and I would just, nothing would happen,” Sandoval explained. Plus, he added, “We’re both so busy. Even when this happened, she’s traveling around, working like crazy. I’m leaving, I’m touring. I swear there were times where like, nobody was in that house for like weeks at a time.”
Sandoval also “couldn’t afford” to get another place.
“It’s one of those things where I feel like it was more of a bigger deal to everybody else than to us,” he noted.
While Ariana has seemed quite irate with him at times, and deservedly so, Sandoval suspected she’s not as angry as she portrays herself to be, even suggesting her emotions are “performative.”
“I feel like she really went out of her way to dehumanize me but it feels more performative than anything because at the end of the day, if she thinks I’m this like, serial killer, then why is she okay living with me?” he wondered. “I feel like on some level she trusted me and felt safe with me being there than her being alone in that house.”
After stating that the “respectable” thing for Sandoval to do would’ve been for him to accept Raquel’s offer of staying at her apartment, Ariana said Sandoval “outright refused” to vacate the home — even just two days after his affair with Raquel was revealed.
“I think he also felt like all of this stuff happened to him, as opposed to him making this stuff happen, and so because of that belief, he also felt like all of it was very unfair,” she explained. “So I think that was part of the reason he was like digging his heels in and throwing parties and doing whatever else because it was like almost like a kid throwing a tantrum.”
“It was weird but then there were parts of it that weren’t so bad,” she continued. “The primary bedroom being as it is kind of set me up to be in a place where I could potentially be in there and have everything that I needed and not really feel like I was having to uproot or do anything that made me feel uncomfortable.”
Still, Ariana felt out of the loop with what was going on in the rest of her residence, even admitting, “I think Billie Lee literally lives in my house right now.”
Luckily, she maintained a positive outlook about the future division of her assets.
“I lived through what I thought was my worst-case scenario and I learned I can do anything, So I can live in an annoying living situation for two months if it means I’m setting my future up in a good way for me,” Ariana concluded.
Vanderpump Rules season 11 airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on Bravo.
