Katie Thurston Seemingly Responds to 'Wild' John Hersey Rumors After Split

Season 17 Bachelorette Katie Thurston sent John Hersey home during week two of her journey — details on their friendship

Katie Thurston Seemingly Responds Wild John Hersey Rumors After Split — Television personality Katie Thurston and John Hersey arrive at the Freeform ‘Halloween Road’ Talent And Press Preview Night held at the Heritage Square Museum on September 30, 2021 in Los Angeles, California, United States. Image Press Agency/NurPhoto/Shutterstock

Perfectly platonic? Katie Thurston seemingly responded to comments about her close bond with Bachelorette‘s John Hersey — but her answer still has fans guessing about where they stand.

The 30-year-old Washington native has remained good friends with the 27-year-old bartender despite sending him home during week two of her Bachelorette season, which concluded earlier this year. After sharing a throwback video of “the first time I saw John since filming” via her Instagram Story on Sunday, November 7, Thurston followed up with another coy photo.

“Y’all getting wild in my DMs,” she wrote alongside a laughing emoji. The Instagram Story upload featured individual Polaroid photos of the BFFs, one of which showed Thurston shielding her face with playing cards.

The former ABC personalities have spent plenty of time together since wrapping the reality dating series, frequently sharing footage from their hangouts on social media. Before Blake Moynes proposed during the season finale in August, some followers were convinced that sparks were flying between Thurston and Hersey.

“Internet rumors lead me to this guy becoming a dear dear friend,” the season 25 Bachelor alum joked via Instagram in September after a day out with Hersey in California.

When the bank marketing manager and the wildlife consultant, 31, announced in October that they had called off their engagement, fans were quick to ship her with Hersey.

“Hope you’re more than friends now!!!🙌❤️,” one user commented on Thurston’s September photos with the California native, while another teased that it “won’t be long” until a romance blooms between them.

Fans continued to wonder about the pair’s status when Thurston appeared to share a pic of Hersey’s dog via her Instagram Story in the wake of her breakup from Moynes. “Dexter forcing me out of the house this morning,” she wrote alongside the October snap.

Days later, she posted a photo of a bouquet of flowers sent from a friend with a note that read, “These are not romantic flowers. These are happy flowers. Because … I want you to be happy,” which many believed to be from Hersey.

Since she and the Canadian went their separate ways, Thurston recently revealed that they “still stay in touch” and “support each other.” She also defended the “authenticity” of their whirlwind relationship in an emotional social media post.

“We were together for six months [and] Blake and I are very level-headed and mature, and we communicate very well on our thoughts,” she explained via Instagram on October 31. “And we just both knew if this was how our first six months was as a couple, going forward it was going to not be in our best interest for our happiness to stay together. … Obviously, a public relationship ending is a really sh—ty thing to have to navigate, but you guys have been very kind and supportive and I wanted to say thank you for being that way to me and to Blake.”

She concluded at the time, “At the end of the day your happiness is what’s important and if something is taking that away from you — and that’s not even a dig at Blake, it’s just a dig at what him and I were as partners — then we owe it to each other to step away, so that’s what we’re doing.”

Moynes, for his part, noted in an Instagram post of his own that the split was “really tough” to work through, writing on November 1, “Feels good to start getting back into the swing of things.”