Not Gone Yet

I woke up in a cold sweat at three in the morning thinking about Miley Cyrus without a shirt. The dream had somehow convinced me I hadn’t seen a decent topless photo of her in years—and I was right. Ever since she started doing the whole responsible adult thing, which frankly hasn’t been working. So I grabbed my phone and spent half an hour scrolling through the Miley folder, the collection of better years, just trying to calm down enough to sleep again.

The next morning she dropped a new topless shot on Twitter. Hands covering the important parts, but enough that I could tell she hasn’t forgotten about us—the ones who’ve actually been around since before she decided to perform maturity. Not the full sun-soaked nude I’d secretly be waiting for, but topless is topless. It reads like she’s thinking about it. About being whoever she actually is underneath all the reinvention.

I’ve been watching her negotiate with herself for years. The free spirit or the dignified adult. She keeps landing in this dead zone between them, and it’s painful because you know she doesn’t belong there. I save the new photo, add it to the bloated folder on my phone, and scroll back through the times she seemed closer to just saying fuck it. I’m not expecting a revolution. But every now and then she gives us something like this, and I take it as proof that the Miley I actually liked isn’t completely gone. Just dormant. Maybe waiting for the day she finally stops caring what anyone thinks.