Now that we don’t talk: a break up song, or tale of an ended friendship?
You don’t need a deadbeat ex to relate to Taylor Swift’s music!
Upon first listen of the 1989 Taylor’s Version vault tracks, most fans were swept away with the nearly blatant crucifixion of circa 2013 ex-boyfriend Harry Styles. After all, there are too many easter eggs to count in “Is It Over Now?” and in “Now That We Don’t Talk” as well.
However—personally, I hear a story of a female friendship that ended, and it ended badly. Like, there was blocking and maybe blood involved.
Allow me to tell this interpreted tale through the eyes of a girl in a close friendship with the “pick me girl,” or rather a girl who utilizes female friendships as stepping stones to an ultimate goal: receiving approval from men. This type of girl tends to be a common denominator in many female-friendship “falling-outs.”
[Verse 1]
You went to a party
I heard from everybody
You part the crowd like the Red Sea
Don't even get me started
At times of vulnerability, it can be easy to envy this girl. Her ability to command attention so effortlessly is infuriating. You’ll find yourself questioning what it is that she has that you don’t, only to discover one day that it’s a manufactured persona of people-pleasing: a facade.
Did you get anxious though
On the way home?
I guess I'll never, ever know
Now that we don't talk
When in a close friendship with this girl, you see all the humanity and faults underneath, the vulnerability no one else sees, that she doesn’t let anyone see. It soothes you to know she’s not perfect either, but it irks you to watch her lie to everybody.
[Verse 2]
You grew your hair long
You got new icons
And from the outside
It looks like you're tryin' lives on
When on the outside looking in on this ended relationship, it usually feels like the other person is doing better without you. As aesthetically pleasing as their life can seem through the curated streams of Instagram and Snapchat stories, there is no way for you to tell if they are hurting the same way you are behind the screen, and that infuriates you. However, in some cases, there can be a level of comfort to seeing this manufactured image from your ex-friend: you know how they are, after all, and you can visibly see them struggle to redefine themselves with you no longer in their life.
I miss the old ways
You didn't have to change
But I guess I don't have a say
Now that we don't talk
It can be dangerously easy at this point in the friendship breakup to romanticize the version of this friend you lost. You will feel as though you lost a past version in which their behavior was better, when in reality, you lost the tolerable degree to which they showed their true colors to you, causing you to think there was some kind of devolution from once being the “perfect friend,” when in reality they never were.
[Chorus]
I call my mom, she said that it was for the best
Remind myself, the morе I gave, you'd want me less
I cannot bе your friend, so I pay the price of what I lost
And what it cost, now that we don't talk
In these situations, moms tend to be right from the start. Your mother may have gotten an “off vibe” from this girl from the get, to which you constantly defended her—only to discover mother truly knows best. When you romanticize the supposed “great” friend this girl was, you must often physically remind yourself how her friendship affected you: a one-sided push and pull left entirely up to you. These reminders slowly seep in, causing you to realize that forgiveness and forgetting (as Taylor herself even once said) are not necessary or helpful to your situation.
[Bridge]
What do you tell your friends we
Shared dinners, long weekends with?
Truth is, I can't pretend it's
Platonic, it's just ended, so
When you cut contact with somebody, it can be incredibly tempting to ponder how their friends may perceive you or what side of the story they were told by your ex-friend. Were they lied to? Spread some vicious rumors about you? Do you try to keep in contact with them? Set the record straight? Do you hurt your reputation by doing so? It can be difficult to have to sever multiple ties when you only intended to sever the one.
[Outro]
I don't have to pretend I like acid rock
Or that I'd like to be on a mega yacht
With important men who think important thoughts
Guess maybe I am better off now that we don't talk
And the only way back to my dignity
Was to turn into a shrouded mystery
Just like I had been when you were chasing me
Guess this is how it has to be now that we don't talk
These lines particularly strike a chord with this interpretation since they showcase explicit male interest. Though these examples seem to be given through the image of a toxically masculine ex-boyfriend, the “pick-me ex-best-friend” is just as vulnerable to devaluing traditionally feminine interest in favor of high-brow, inaccessible, and gate-kept male interest: to fulfill the void where positive representations of gender were meant to be in childhood. Sometimes, the realization of what we, in fact, did lose is the best way to overcome these losses. You lost your good friend, but you also lost the constant critique of your interests, the imbalance of power, and the cancerous, ever-present negativity gnawing away at your life. In these situations, your friend may try to reach out, but this is because they can’t resist you when you return to your original state of not needing them. In fact, that is their biggest fear.
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