Did Jeremiah cheat on Belly? The Summer I Turned Pretty author explains truth

22 July 2025, 16:01 | Updated: 22 July 2025, 16:05

Did Jeremiah actually cheat on Belly in The Summer I Turned Pretty? Picture: Prime Video

By Katie Louise Smith

Belly thinks Jeremiah cheated on her, but author Jenny Han won't say for sure whether he did or not.

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Did Jeremiah cheat on Belly? Or were they broken up at the time? The Summer I Turned Pretty viewers have been locked in a fierce debate about Jeremiah's big reveal at the end of episode 1, and now author Jenny Han has weighed in.

At the start of the season 3, Belly finds out that Jeremiah hooked up with another girl in Cabo while they were broken up. She confronts him at a party where he confirms it and later apologises, saying he was sad and drunk. However, a distraught Belly was left feeling like she'd been cheated on.

If you're looking for a definitive answer on whether or not they actually were broken up or on a break, you're not gonna find it... Jenny Han has now explained why she won't clarify the storyline and why she has to lowkey defend Jeremiah's actions.

Read more: When do new episodes of The Summer I Turned Pretty come out? Release schedule revealed

Does Belly end up with Jeremiah in The Summer I Turned Pretty season 3? — The Summer I Turned Pretty author explains why she has to defend Jeremiah's actions. Picture: Erika Doss/Prime Video

Did Jeremiah cheat on Belly or were they broken up?

The whole debate about whether or not Jeremiah "cheated" on Belly is meant to be complicated without a straight forward answer. And Jenny, who also wrote the storyline into the books, is keeping a pretty open mind about it too.

"That's debatable whether or not that's considered cheating or not," she said when asked by PEOPLE about Jeremiah's actions. "Because they technically were broken up."

"They were on a break," the interviewer responds, referring to the age old debate between Ross and Rachel in Friends, to which Jenny responds: "Yes, or broken up!"

"It's really how different people [interpret it]," she clarified.

Did Jeremiah cheat on Belly or were they broken up at the time? . Picture: Prime Video

Discussing the storyline further, Jenny added: "I think that for me, as the creator of the world and the characters, I have to have empathy for all of them.

Jenny explained that she has to "see their side and walk in their shoes and feel protective of [her characters]," no matter what they do, and that also applies to Jeremiah's Spring Break hook up.

"So I do," she said. "For all of the characters."

Reacting in the comment section of the TikTok, fans were still debating the whole thing. Belly defenders were out in full force, with one fan writing: "Broken up but with an intention of getting back together !!!!"

"If he didn’t think it was cheating, why keep it a SECRET?," another added.

One Jeremiah fan wrote: "As a jeremiah girlie, the problem wasn’t the 'cheating part' (clarifying I do not think he cheated), the problem was that he didn’t say anything to her when he had the chance. If he would’ve said something in the moment, belly would’ve taken the situation 100% differently. But in the end Jere recognized his mistake and made up for it. That’s what matters the most."