Monica Garcia Tells Heather Gay to ‘Put Her Big Girl Panties On’ and Have Her Back on RHOSLC

“I think if Heather Gay wasn’t there that I would have a chance,” Garcia told TooFab in a new interview. “I think that she is, you know, the number one person who doesn’t want me on the cast.”

Gay, of course, is the one who exposed Garcia as one of the people behind a Real Housewives of Salt Lake City gossip account on Instagram — pulling out all the “Receipts! Proof! Timeline! Screenshots!” in dramatic fashion on the Season 4 finale. Heather also told Andy Cohen that, going forward, “There’s no chance that Monica will be welcome back in my business, near my family, or near my friends.”

Speaking with TooFab ahead of her appearance Thursday night at Jennifer Dilandro’s Dolce Aesthetics Pride party in NYC, Garcia pleaded her case for her return.

“So maybe if there was like a cast shake up or maybe if it just came down to, ‘f–king deal with it and this is what it is or leave,’ then I don’t know,” she said of how she could possibly make a comeback.

“I think that’s what we need, I think the fans are so invested in this. They’re so invested in this journey that is Reality Von Tease and I think that Heather needs to put her big girl panties on and realize this is what we do, and this is what the fans deserve,” she continued. “They deserve to see that bridge and how this all works, get the f–k over yourself and let’s give the fans what they want … she just needs to pull it together.”

Between wrapping her one and only season on RHOSLC and filming the reunion, Garcia appeared at BravoCon. She, however, did press interviews on the red carpet solo the day before everyone else in the cast.

“It was weird and I definitely felt the divide, but I also think that it worked out for the best because we were not on speaking terms and I think it would’ve been very awkward had we been, you know, doing press and things like that together,” shared Monica. “It was my first BravoCon so I didn’t even know that we were supposed to do press all together until I saw them doing press all together.”

Monica felt the separation was both by Bravo’s design and possibly at the request of her costars.

“Maybe it was a mix of both. I’m sure they didn’t want us to engage before the reunion and they wanted that to be as real as possible,” she explained. “That was the first time we saw each other from Bermuda so they did a great job making sure we had that moment for a reunion.”

Garcia said she hasn’t run into any of the women from her show since the reunion either, telling TooFab she saw Whitney Rose once at a store, but they didn’t speak. The community of Salt Lake, however, has continued to be supportive to Garcia.

“Honestly, everyone in Salt Lake is so sweet, I haven’t had anyone be mean or rude to me. Everyone is so kind,” she shared. “At the end of the day, you can tell that the fans are like, ‘No matter what happens, that was incredible television and whether we like you or hate you, you gave us the best season ever,’ so yeah, everyone has been so nice.”

She also said she’s received support from some fellow Bravolebrities after meeting them at BravoCon.

“A lot of them are Housewives and they’ve been through it, they’ve been on both sides, and they understand how it works,” she said of the support. “You have your great seasons; you have your bad seasons, and you have the in-between. I know that my cast tried really hard to make it to where people hated me and some of them fell for that, but yeah, there’s been Lisa, Chanel, Caroline Stansbury – she was so sweet, the cast of Miami was amazing. Dolores from New Jersey was incredible, there’s just been so many amazing, amazing people.”

Garcia also gave fans an update on where things stand with her mother, Linda, after a series of on-air fights between the two during her tumultuous season. Those blowups, said Monica, were “brutal” for her to watch back.

“When you’re living it, you’re kind of just used to it and numb and you don’t see it as that bad but watching this season back and seeing it from that perspective was so eye opening,” she shared. “My mother and I have not spoken at all since we wrapped, it’s been months and months and I don’t see that relationship ever rekindling.”

“She took the car back, again, after stuff that I said at the reunion and I was just like, ‘We are done, we are done,” she added. “She went nuts on social media like a crazy person and that was the last straw for me.”

Speaking with TooFab, Monica also reacted to the new lawsuit filed against Lisa Barlow this week — see what she had to say about it here.