Life and love come at you fast on Temptation Island.

Sydney and her boyfriend of over a year, Mikey, joined Season 2 of the dating series, which is streaming now, in hopes of building deeper intimacy and trust. Instead, their journey ends with her exchanging “I love yous” with Xzavier, a man she’d met just weeks before. 

While Sydney never expected the outcome — she also couldn’t have anticipated that Xzaiver would give her a “different perspective on what men in today's dating world look like.”

“Every bonfire tore me up,” Mikey tells Tudum about watching his girlfriend fall for another guy. “From what I saw, I was getting in the way of a love story between those two.” 

So why did Sydney fall so hard? What were Xzavier’s true intentions? And how does Mikey feel about it all? Keep reading to hear from all three about the love triangle that rocked Temptation Island Season 2. 

According to Sydney, it all started with a guitar solo. When Xzavier performed a song and dedicated it to Sydney in a bar crowded with other housemates, something shifted. “Being pointed out, feeling chosen, and being like, ‘Wow, he’s showing everybody in here that I'm his person,’ ” Sydney says.

Before she had any inkling that she and Xzavier could form a serious connection, Sydney began noticing little things. The very first night, he asked about her boundaries, and she told him, in no uncertain terms, “No physical touch. I don’t want anything to disrupt my relationship unless something happens.” Later on, Sydney was struggling to walk on rocks in heels, and Xzavier wanted to help steady her, but he resisted. “Well, you told me not to touch you,” he said to Sydney, hesitantly. “I just knew from then, he’s a really respectful, genuine, good guy,” she says.

From there, trust began to build between Sydney and Xzavier. “I was really open to just learning about her and offering advice,” he says. Sydney felt that. “A lot of strong relationships start as friends,” she explains, adding that being able to talk about her past relationships and who she is as a person pushed her to open up to the possibility that their friendship could become something more. “He gave me a different perspective on what men in today's dating world look like.”

On the other side of the island, Mikey was connecting and flirting with more than a few singles — albeit on a more surface level. “It takes me a long time to like a person, because I know when I catch feelings, I’m down bad,” he says. “I really wanted to be with Sydney. That was my end-all, be-all.” 

As her relationship with Xzavier began to progress, Sydney admits she had reservations about ending her relationship with Mikey and diving into something new. “The hardest moment was having to let go of my best friend,” she says.  “But I know that that relationship wasn’t good for my mental health… He’s a great guy, but he’s just not my guy.” Xzavier, too, was well aware of the complicated web he was stepping into. But, aware that all parties knew what they signed up for, he says, “I could only control myself, and I felt affirmed in how I showed up and respected that space.”

For Mikey, the most painful part of his experience was seeing a bonfire clip of Sydney and Xzavier doing a handshake that reminded him of the one he used to do with her. “That one hit me worse than all the physical things I saw. That hit crazy. I was like, ‘Oh, that's messed up.’ ” Because he hadn’t crossed any physical boundaries, it was confusing to see Sydney getting so close with Xzavier so quickly. “It just took me flirting for all of that to happen?” he wonders.

After Sydney confessed her feelings to Xzavier at the final bonfire, he quickly followed up with a confession of his own. “I’ve been loving you for some time,” Xzavier responded. “I’ve never told a guy I loved them first. So it was very nerve-wracking,” Sydney says. “I definitely felt like the feeling was mutual… We had just had so many conversations about what [a relationship] looked like outside the villa and if we could make it work, and regardless, the bond we made there will last forever.” 

Xzavier admits he was “nervous” to reciprocate her feelings. “I don’t take words like that lightly,” he says. But after many conversations with Sydney and thinking things over, he knew he was ready to express his genuine feelings. “She created a space that was safe for us to say those words.”

Before those “I love yous,” Sydney had to first close the book on her relationship with Mikey, who’d also decided he had to leave solo in order to heal. Looking back, however, Mikey admits that, in spite of all the growth and pain he’d experienced, it would have been hard to turn Sydney down if she did want to still be with him. “I know I left by myself, but if she would’ve said to me, ‘I want to go home with you,’ I probably would’ve been like, ‘All right. Bet. We got a lot to figure out.’ ”

For Sydney, there was no question. “This experience really showed me what I deserved as a woman,” she says — and that was Xzavier. For Mikey, their ending certainly wasn’t what he expected going into the experience, but he doesn’t feel as if he walked away completely empty-handed. “My biggest lesson was it’s OK to be transparent with your emotions, and it’s OK to love purely and outwardly,” he says.

Given Mikey’s heartbreak, Sydney and Xzavier’s final exchange on the island was slightly bittersweet for host Mark L. Walberg. “One of the things about my job is that I get invested in eight people, really invested,” he says. “So when I see Sydney falling in love, I’m also thinking of Mikey a little bit.” But new beginnings are beautiful, no matter what. “Whenever I see two people falling in love, I’m happy for that,” Mark shares. “Now how long did it last? We’ll see.”

Return to Tudum soon for updates on what has happened since the Season 2 participants left the island. And in the meantime, check out the status update for a full recap of where each couple stands at the end of the season, as well as Mark’s exclusive takes on their Temptation Island journeys.

Watch the Season 2 Couples Before They Entered Temptation Island