HONEY

10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU dir. Gil Junger

we had some good times, didn’t we? we had some good tricks up our sleeve; goodbyes are bittersweet, but it’s not the end, i’ll see your face again

Legend: Harry’s lyrical perspective in Exile, Taylor’s perspective, Harry’s own lyrics

Here’s an evaluation of everything I’ve gathered so far:

It’s a song touching on the incident that took place at the 2015 BBMAs. This was Taylor’s first official/fancy public appearance with Calvin Harris, and she took him with her to the awards. Too much too soon, right? Because she wanted a rebound and for Harry to see her moving on.

Before the awards, Harry and Taylor we’re still attending parties together, like Caleb Followill’s, and staying in contact.

I think I’ve seen this film before

After seeing Taylor at a party a month before, Harry had tweeted the word ‘Serendipity’ which is the title of a film based on a British woman and American man breakin up but then being brought back together by fate. He was hopeful.

Then, Taylor met Calvin. It’s February at this point. Paparazzi pics are out. Harry, on Taylor’s 24th birthday, had tweeted ‘better still be my winding wheel’ a lyric from a song about soulmates. On the exact day the pictures of Taylor & Calvin came out, he tweeted and instagrammed a picture of a wheel, captioning it: “my winding wheel.” (Dejected, right?)

In any case. She’s his soulmate. This can’t be a serious thing.

Taylor stops contacting Harry after meeting Calvin. Ignores his calls and texts. Posts pictures of herself with Calvin on Instagram, like this one:

Taylor shows up with Calvin to the Billboard awards. Very soon, but she wants him to see. The entire evening is spent with them being overly showy, lots of PDA, etc. Quite unlike Taylor. She wins several awards for 1989, and hugs Calvin each time. She’s seen laughing very exaggeratedly.

I can see you standing, honey with his arms around your body vs. I hope you can see, the shape that I’m in while he’s touching your skin

Laughing, but the joke’s not funny at all

Then, comes the blow. Just as One Direction are announced to have won an award and Harry comes up on the stage to retrieve it.

I can see it written all over his face, comfortable silence is so overrated. Why won’t you ever say what you want to say? Even my phone, misses your call, by the way

Taylor looks straight at him and whispers something into Calvin’s ear. At this point, you are internally groaning. Why did she do it? No one knows, it was a terrible thing to do. Imagine someone you were so close to doing that to you. Pain.

I can see you staring, honey

Like he’s just your understudy

Like you’d get your knuckles bloody for me

Those eyes add insult to injury

Harry’s eyes keep flickering back to where they’re sitting. He’s hurt, although he’s trying to concentrate on the award he seems distract and he keeps looking in Taylor’s direction, like, “what are you doing?”

Anyway. Harry’s jealous. He writes a song about this whole experience called Woman.

Now. Taylor writes Exile about both of their perspectives of this incident. Harry’s jealous and confused, because this isn’t Taylor. Taylor’s not sure what she’s doing entirely, but she feels this is necessary because Harry has not noticed or acted on any of the signs she’s dropped that she misses him (songs, meaningful glances she sings about, etc.) but I argue that Taylor hasn’t been reading his mind correctly, either. Just a month before he’d tweeted many hints. There’s a lot of miscommunication and pain, because even if things are obvious to you, they may not always be obvious to the other person, no matter how in tune you are: Communication is important.

We always walked a very thin line vs. We’ll be a fine line

You never gave me a warning sign vs. It’s a sign of the times

I gave you so many signs, so many times

There is no amount of crying I can do for you vs. Just stop your crying it’s a sign of the times

I think that the song Sign of the Times is also about their miscommunication and their transition to a new life without each other’s tangible presence. It’s referenced in Exile, as well. (“I gave you so many signs, you couldnt even read my mind, couldn’t turn things around”) Harry sees this as the one big sign that him and Taylor were in the rocks, but Taylor has repeatedly given him so many signs, and so has he. There is no amount of crying that will fix this, a lyric shared between Exile and SOTT. They’re always back in the same pattern, and so always walk a fine line between being okay and facing the next roadblock (“we always walked a very thin line” is also an Exile reference to Fine Line, which I explained was about Haylor in this post)

And it took you five whole minutes

To pack us up and leave me with it vs. I can’t unpack the baggage you left

Holdin’ all this love out here in the hall vs. You left me in the hallway

But I’ve also noticed something else. Like I said in this post, there are a lot of similarities to Harry’s songs in Exile. Not only Woman, but in particular Meet Me in the Hallway. They both talk about their relationship essentially ending in a hallway. What hall was this? Did Harry confront her at the music awards? Did Taylor ignore him? Or is it something metaphorical?

All in all, I think that Taylor and Harry were both confused. Taylor was trying to get a rise out of Harry to see if he was still in this, (“I’m not your homeland anymore, so who am I offending?”) but Harry was just hurt and his signs were just as misunderstood as Taylor’s.

This is what I have so far, will update as I find something new.

Songs referenced: Exile, Woman, Meet Me in the Hallway, Falling, From the Dining Table, Sign of the Times, Fine Line

please, picture me in the weeds before I learned civility, I used to scream ferociously any time I wanted.

Matt Champion (Brockhampton)