Olivia reveals Aneesa started her feud with Nurys on The Challenge: 'Aneesa randomly turned on me'

Warning: This article contains spoilers for The Challenge: Battle for a New Champion episode 17, "Feel the Bern."

The call was coming from inside the Challenge house!

The Challenge: Battle for a New Champion doesn't have any longtime vets on the cast, but one franchise mainstay still managed to start some drama without even being in the house thanks to a pivotal phone call home. When Nurys Mateo spoke to her family over video chat, her brother told her that her friend/ally Olivia Kaiser had been saying bad things about her before the season began. While fans don't get any more information about it in the episode, Olivia tells EW that it was her former friend Aneesa Ferreira who said that to Nurys' brother, which helped lead to their eventual feud.

"Yeah, it was Aneesa," Olivia says. "Me and Aneesa were really close after Ride or Dies. I had a great time with her, but all the time, I heard from every single person I ever talked to, 'Don't trust her, don't trust her, don't trust her.' I was like, 'Why? She's the best, I love her.' So of course, you vent about your friends at times, you say things, but I will say that I never said [Nurys] was 'broke' or I was using her for the game or faking a friendship, whatever that was. That was not the truth."

Olivia still doesn't understand why Aneesa would say those things to Nurys' brother. "I don't know why Aneesa randomly turned on me," she says. "She messaged me a week before the show and we were just fine. I definitely pulled myself away from Aneesa at one point, just because I kind of felt she talks a lot of s--- and I was like, 'That's kind of a dangerous place to be,' but we were still fine."

As for why Aneesa was even talking to Nurys' brother in the first place? "I'm not going to spill anyone's romantic life too much, but Aneesa and Nurys' brother had a little rendezvous situation," Olivia says. "I think that drinks were flowing, maybe she just felt like she wanted to get closer to Nurys' brother by s---ting on me, I don't know her MO. But she never liked Nurys, never said anything good about Nurys, so it's so funny that she's turning it on me when I was always in her corner, either not saying anything or defending. It's unfortunate that happened, but is what it is."

Below, Olivia breaks down what went wrong between her and Nurys, why she questioned her friendship with her Ride or Dies partner Horacio Gutierrez Jr., why she chose to save Moriah Jadea in last week's episode, and her elimination loss that ultimately ended her season right before the final.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: How are you feeling about the way you went out this season, right before the final?

OLIVIA KAISER: At this point in the game, honestly I was so checked out. I was like, "Whatever, screw the final." Because when I made my decision to save Moriah and that whole thing went down, it was never my intention to be playing a desperate game, to be like, "I have to make this final at all costs." It was more just of a split-second decision of how to stay in it. When I was going into the elimination and I lost, they don't show everything, but I was clapping for Nurys. She was freezing, I warmed her up, we were celebrating her win, and I was happy because I wasn't proud of how I'd gotten there. And going forward, I want to be proud of how I play the game all the way to the final.

A lot has come out on social media while this season has been airing, so where do you stand with your friendships with Nurys and Moriah today?

Moriah, we're not friends — we're just existing. And then Nurys and me, she's hot and cold with how she feels about me. She'll forgive me and then she won't. And I understand that because, obviously, emotions change when you see the episodes and when you talk to people and people are justifying your feelings. But there's only so much I can do and so much sorry I can be until I feel like I'm getting personally abused. Right now, she has said that she's never going to forgive me. I'm going to respect that and just keep moving forward in my life.

I'm regretful. I feel bad and I regret my decision. I don't know how many more times I can say that to her to make her be okay. I think it's just going to take time. She doesn't have to trust me again. That's fair. But forgiving me and moving forward, because we all are human, the moment that someone forgives, it's going to be a weight off of their shoulders. Holding on to animosity like this, when you know it was an actual mistake and a regretful one at that and it wasn't in cold blood, I think that there should be a little bit more grace. But who am I to say how someone should feel or how someone should forgive someone?

It looked like you and Nurys had fixed your friendship before your elimination, so what is the issue now? Does it stem from the call with her family or what she's seeing in the episodes?

Yeah, I think it's everything. She came back in the house, I explained to her exactly what happened and she said she forgave me. I was actually pleasantly surprised at how we got on after that. Then before the final, there's a couple days that everyone's rotting at the house, sitting down and chilling, and I think people cross-reference different things and work each other up, wanting someone to blame. Which, rightfully so, I was to blame for her going in, but not to blame for other things. I released my podcast on my truth, and I was in no way trying to devalue me and Nurys' friendship. It was more of a message to the public on how I'm not a backstabbing friend. But I think she took that as devaluing our friendship and not taking ownership [of my actions]. I completely disagree, but again, who am I to say how someone should feel? So I think was the last trigger on her.

But like I said, I only can say sorry for so long and get kicked in the face so many times until I have to defend myself and stand up for myself. I'm already down. She's a queen in the castle right now —spitting on me. I get it. I don't know what else I can do. Hopefully one day we'll be cool and cordial, but right now I definitely think things are hot — and not on my end.

What has it been like for you watching this season and especially seeing that phone call with her family?

It's hard because I don't really have any ground to stand on right now. At the same time, it hurts me that she didn't come immediately to me. It makes me think that she did believe it, whether she is denying she believed it or not. If someone said that to me, I would run up to my friend immediately and say something. I could say a lot of things, but I just prefer to apologize and move forward. There's only so much one person can take though... I want to be defensive, but I'm trying my best not to be. But I'm feeling really personally attacked.

I made a horrible decision, which was a game decision. I never came at anyone's character or who they were or secrets that they said to me or anything like that as a friend. But I'm getting dogged about my personality, about my looks, about my character, about my friendships, about everything. It's so personal and it's hard for me to keep saying, "I'm sorry about this game move," but it doesn't give you the right to absolutely obliterate me as a human being. That's not cool and it's not fair. And I'm starting to get pissed.

But I will say, I've been at the top. I've been looked at and idolized, and I like to think that I was humble in that. When you're not humble while being on top, it's going to come and crash down real hard. That's just something to remember: Always stay humble and what goes around comes around. Clearly, it did for me. But this is a game. It's hard to separate the game and personal connections. And you know what? I've learned the biggest lesson, and now I know how to move accordingly next time.

When you chose to save Moriah over Nurys after making the deal with Jay and Michele, did you consider agreeing to that in the moment to save yourself and then just picking Nurys anyway?

Of course, it was in my head like, "Oh my God, should I save Nurys?" And then I was just like, "Honestly, no." What they don't show was me and Michele's friendship was equivalent to me and Nurys'. I would be screwing over anyone in the situation, longevity-wise, and the smartest move, I should have just kept my mouth shut, taken it on the chin, and went into elimination. But also it wasn't really fair to me at the time because I've helped everyone — I've helped Corey get integrated back, I befriended Berna, defended Berna to Nurys at times when she did not need defending, I always had Jay's back, and I would do anything for Michele. How am I getting thrown to the wolves when the night before, Nurys was saying, "I want to go home"? I'm not saying I wanted Nurys to be thrown in for that, but I felt so offended in that moment.

So no, I would not have picked Nurys. I mean, it would've been a great move for the show, it would've be so entertaining. But I'm not going to do something just because it's going to be in the fans' best interest. I could not have done that to Michele, knowing that she put everyone else's fate that she's working with on the line, and f---ed her over and had the whole house turn on her because she did me a solid. But I wish Nurys was saved by Colleen, I just wish it happened the way I thought it was going to. I should have kept my mouth shut and let the cards fall the way they were meant to instead of mess with fate.

It does suck because they cut out me trying to switch places [with Nurys]. I'm not trying to be a hero by doing that, but I was trying to make things right in that moment, and the fact they cut it, I was discredited of my moment of feeling immediate remorse and guilt. I look like a cold-blooded friend who is like, "I'll do anything and stab anyone in the back to get to the final." That wasn't what it was, so it's really frustrating. But that's where you have to remember it's a TV show and you have heroes built up, villains dragged down. Unfortunately, I fell in that perfect category all season because it comes down to insecurity. I had insecurity all season — questioning Horacio all season and then questioning where my friendships lay, feeling energy shifts in the house, in that moment being like, "No one has my back, so I'm going to finally choose me," and then by choosing me, I did something that I felt was the worst thing I could have done.

If you could go back and change anything about this season, what would it be?

[Things I would] change? Yeah, honestly because of the fan response and the hate is insane and I also hurt people I love... But questioning Horacio, I don't regret that because that was fair of me. I didn't know what my friendship with Horacio was. We didn't have this nine-year best friendship. I was still getting to know him as a human being. And then, obviously, I went home in this elimination and that was only one episode after [the vote to save Moriah], so why'd I have to cause this whole uproar just to go home the next week? I should've just gone into that elimination. If I go on another season, I'm going to try to go in with confidence and be okay with failing instead of being scared of failing.

The Challenge: Battle for a New Champion airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on MTV.

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