Nicole Is Back In Salem on Days of Our Lives — For Good!

While the news broke ages ago that Arianne Zucker would be returning to Days of Our Lives as her beloved character Nicole Walker, it looks like it’s not for one of those short arcs. Instead, the fan favorite is back to stay!

According to published reports, the actress credits both fan support and talking with executive producer Ken Corday for making her return possible. While she left the show originally in June of 2017, she did return to wrap up the story — but, of course, everyone assumed that wouldn’t really be the end of Nicole.

The timing seemed to be right, since Nicole’s love, Eric (Greg Vaughan) was beginning to have feelings for someone else. Poor Sarah (Linsey Godfrey) has been torn between Eric and his half-brother Rex (Kyle Lowder). Eric never seemed ready to make the leap since he was still nursing a broken heart over losing Nicole.

That seems to be changing as he keeps being encouraged by his mother, Marlena (Deidre Hall), to come clean with Sarah and let her know that he does have feelings for her. It’s a good bet that with Nicole coming back, that he’ll do just that so that things are as messy as possible — just the way soap fans like it.

During her time away, Zucker took the opportunity to continue acting but also to spend more time with her daughter (whose father, Zucker’s ex-husband Kyle Lowder who is also back on the show playing Rex) — time that isn’t always available when in the daily grind of appearing on a soap.

There are familiar faces and some new ones too for Zucker, who said that she’s enjoying working with Godfrey and getting to know her. It will also be interesting for fans to get to know Nicole again.

After all, she’s been gone a while and has had a lot happen to her during her time away. What will she be like? It doesn’t look like you’ll have to wait long to find out!

Days of our Lives (DOOL) airs weekdays on NBC. Check your local listings for airtimes.