Miley Cyrus dropped her new album, Plastic Hearts, today, and fans are already all over the possible meaning behind the lyrics. "Angels Like You" is the third track on the album,
and—some curious people are convinced—is apparently about Cyrus's ex, Kaitlynn Carter.
sorry but i still think angels like you is about kaitlynn and you won’t change my mind.
— dan (@kissmebadkarmaa) November 26, 2020
“My angel of a girlfriend” - confirms Angels Like You is about Kaitlynn
— dan (@kiiismebadkarma) July 30, 2020
Ohh this leak thing got in a new level, there are explanations on genius about some sings! lol angel like you is about kaitlynn I didn’t know that
— TeamMiley (@TeamMiley111) May 26, 2020
I feel like high was about Nick, angels like you about Kaitlynn, hate me about Liam and never be me about liam and nick
— n¡na♚| Midnight Sky? (@xradiatlove) November 27, 2020
The two dated for a month in the summer of 2019, following Cyrus's split from her husband of less than a year and on-and-off partner of ten years, Liam Hemsworth.
The song starts off like this: "Flowers in hand, waiting for me / Every word in poetry / Won't call me by name, only 'baby' / The more that you give, the less that I need / Everyone says I look happy / When it feels right," which could reference the pictures of Carter and Cyrus on vacation together, looking like they were having a blast, in the summer of 2019:
"Miley is very close with Kaitlynn," a source told People then. "It's romantic, but also a friendship. They are both going through similar stuff right now and are bonding over it." The source added: "Miley is okay, but you can tell she isn't 100 percent happy."
Cyrus seems to reference her complicated feelings about her time with Carter in this next set of lyrics: "I know that you're wrong for me / Gonna wish we never met on the day I leave I brought you down to your knees / 'Cause they say that misery loves company / It's not your fault I ruin everything / And it's not your fault I can't be what you need / Baby, angels like you can't fly down here with me / I'll put you down slow, love you goodbye / Before you let go, just one more time / Take off your clothes, pretend that it's fine / A little more hurt won't kill you / Tonight mama says you don't look happy / Close your eyes."
"I'm everything they said I would be / La, la, la / I'm everything they said I would be," the post-chorus reads.
In a November essay for ELLE, Carter discusses about summer with Cyrus, which followed the end of her marriage with Brody Jenner.
This past July, I went on vacation with a female friend; the next thing I knew, I was in love with her," she wrote, later adding: "Until that trip, it had never crossed my mind that I was even capable of loving a woman the way I loved her...I fell just as hard for her as I had the older man so many years before. It was that same familiar force of nature; I didn’t have to think about a thing or overanalyze. It just happened and it felt exactly right. Reflecting back on our three-year friendship, I realized I’d always been drawn to her in a way I wasn’t with other friends, but until that trip it had never crossed my mind to think of her in a romantic sense."
All I'll say is that, on the heels of Happiest Seasonand, Dashing in December, and A New York Christmas Wedding, we could use some more queer content to lose our minds over this holiday season. If this song is about Kaitlynn, that'll only validate the fact that I'm already applying it to all of the leftover angst I have about my queer breakups. And if not? Well, uh, I'll still cry queer tears while I play this track over and over.