Neighbours Spoilers – Holly and Andrew grow closer as Wendy is sidelined

Next week on Neighbours, Wendy is sidelined in Andrew’s quest to get to know his biological family, while Andrew and Holly grow ever closer.

The past few weeks, we’ve seen Wendy (Candice Leask) embark upon a secret mission to track down Andrew’s (Lloyd Will) birth parents.

Adopted by the Rodwells at a young age, Andrew has known very little about his biological parents, other than that they were from Sandy Point.

When Max (Ben Jackson) and Agnes (Anne Charleston) set about preparing a Robinson Family Tree, their hard work got Andrew thinking about his birth parents – but when Wendy raised the question of whether he’d like to track them down, Andrew dismissed the idea.

Despite Andrew’s fears that he might not like what he found, Wendy decided to ignore his concerns and soon tracked down his sister, Gretchen (Amelia Bishop).

As the two met in secret at Lassiters – hardly the ideal place for a clandestine meet – Gretchen explained that their mother had died some years back, and that their father, Steven, was an alcoholic and a bad man.

Wendy decided against telling Andrew that she’d found his family, realising that he would only be disappointed to learn that his worst fears had been realised, but Andrew soon discovered the truth after answering a call on Wendy’s phone from the Sandy Point Historical Society.

Andrew was furious with Wendy for going behind back yet again, after he’d explicitly told her that he had no interest in tracking down his family.

Last week, Holly (Lucinda Armstrong Hall) began to doubt whether they should take what Gretchen said at face value, after realising how easily everyone had been fooled by Darcy’s (Mark Raffety) lies.

She did some digging of her own, and told Andrew that she’d spoken to Steven on the phone, posing as a journalist, and he seemed lovely.

“I think Holly’s got a bit of a detective streak,” Lucinda Armstrong Hall tells Back to the Bay. “She has a real forward impetus and she does before she thinks. And once she has something in her mind, she has to follow through. It’s that kind of obsessive nature.

“Something just didn’t add up with Gretchen’s story.”

This week, with Wendy left in the dark, the pair headed to Sandy Point, where they met Andrew’s dad and sister for the first time. Steven was instantly welcoming to his long-lost son, and it became immediately clear that he wasn’t the deadbeat that Gretchen had made him out to be.

Gretchen explained that Steven had been suffering from cancer, so she lied to Wendy because she didn’t want Andrew to learn that his father may not have long to live.

However, he’s now responding well to treatment, and was overjoyed to finally meet his son.

Andrew was on a high after he and Holly left Sandy Point, and Holly suggested that they carry on the celebrations at a bar in the city. The pair enjoyed each other’s company over a drink, and it seemed like an unlikely bond was forming between them.

Back in Erinsborough the following day, Andrew made the decision not to tell Wendy about his and Holly’s late-night drink, as we were left wondering why he was so keen to cover it up.

The pair’s bond grew even further when a box of old photographs and memories arrived on the doorstep of No. 26, and they spent the afternoon going through the package together.

Next week, moved by Andrew’s reunion with his family, Holly reaches out to Izzy (Natalie Bassingthwaighte), but in true Izzy style, she’s let down.

“There’s a part of her that’s a little jealous that Andrew gets a second chance at family,” Lucinda explains. “Maybe not so much jealous, but a little bit in awe. Maybe part of her wishes that she could uncover a whole other part of her family that she didn’t realise was there and could have a great relationship with them.”

However, when she seeks out boyfriend Max for sympathy, he struggles to give her the support he needs, considering his and Izzy’s own history – Max’s dad Shane (Peter O’Brien) previously dated Izzy for a number of years.

Right on time, Andrew comes to the rescue and is ready to listen to Holly and offer his non-judgmental support.

The following day, Andrew hears that he’s been invited to a party with his birth family. Wendy is determined to go with him, but having just started her new permanent job at Erinsborough High, she knows it’ll be difficult to take time off.

At the school, things are going well for Wendy, until she has an embarrassing hiccough incident whilst covering a maths class.

Saskia (Mia Foran), Max’s sister who arrived earlier this week, quietly heckles her as she looks for approval from her new classmates, and Wendy soon picks up on her concerning behaviour.

Taking Sadie to one side, Wendy encourages Saskia to be herself and reassures her that all will fall into place, as she also gifts her a pair of handmade earrings.

However, the following day, Wendy is forced to tell Saskia off for being late to class, leaving Saskia feeling embarrassed in front of her new classmates. Soon after, she finds the earrings she gifted Saskia in the bin, and confronts the new arrival.

Sadie claims that one of the students stole the earrings from her, and she fears it’ll be the start of a new bullying campaign, after she left Queensland, where she had also been bullied.

Wendy still has doubts, but has to put them to one side, as Jane (Annie Jones) assures Saskia that the school has a zero-tolerance policy towards bullies.

Meanwhile, Wendy asks Jane if she can have the time off to attend Andrew’s party, but Jane is forced to turn her down – she’s needed at the school for a VCE art assignment and the subsequent exhibition night.

However, Andrew won’t be going alone – back on Ramsay Street, Holly expresses her excitement at Andrew’s party invite.

It looks like Wendy will once again be sidelined for Andrew’s growing connection with one of his daughter’s best friends…

“I think there’s definitely cracks and fissures in the relationship,” Lloyd Will tells us. “Even during the Sandra situation, Andrew was trying to bury his emotions and feelings.

“But [after Wendy tracked his family down behind his back], it just proves to him where his head’s at, that maybe they’re really not on the same page. And that’s a huge problem.

“So it’s either spend a whole heap of time trying to fix this, or have they grown into different people? I don’t know where his head’s at at the moment, but I would be really considering what the future holds.”

Watch this space.