Benson Boone and Alix Earle Locked Lips in a Music Video. The Internet Did the Rest.

Benson Boone wanted to release a heartbreak song. What everyone is actually talking about is the part where he kisses Alix Earle on a fake stage in front of a fake audience, and whether the chemistry stopped when the cameras did.

"The Time of My Life" dropped Thursday, Boone's first new single since last year's "American Heart" album. It is a big, soaring, lighters-up kind of song about missing an ex. Reasonable people could listen to it and feel things. Nobody is doing that. They are watching the video on a loop and pausing on the last fifteen seconds.

What actually happens in the video

The clip, directed by Matt Eastin (the same guy behind Boone's "Mr. Electric Blue"), is built like a stage play. Boone and Earle play two performers about to go on. "Will she be here?" Earle asks him backstage, per Deseret News, and the camera cuts to an empty reserved seat in the audience with a heart marked on it. Subtle, this video is not.

Then the play takes over. Boone and Earle fall in love through a montage of increasingly unhinged set pieces: a boat ride, a sword fight in a tavern, an actual dragon. They get married. And right when you think the influencer gets the pop star, Boone bails on Earle mid-wedding to go chase the memory of the ex who never showed. The thing closes with the two of them back on the real stage, sharing a kiss while the audience applauds.

So the plot is "he picks the ghost." The internet's takeaway is "they kissed."

The dating thing, handled honestly

Here is where I have to be the responsible one, which is not my favorite genre. There is no confirmed relationship. There is a pile of stuff that fans have decided adds up to one.

The breadcrumbs, all reported, not invented:

• TMZ first reported on June 4 that Earle was starring in the video, and she spent the week filming with Boone.
• TMZ's sources described the on-set chemistry as "undeniable," with Earle laughing around Boone and the vibe reading flirty. Treat that as exactly what it is: anonymous sourcing about vibes.
• The two were photographed leaving dinner at Craig's in Los Angeles on June 19. When a TMZ photographer asked Boone directly if they were dating, he said, "Uh, no," and called it "just hanging out."
• Back on June 10, Boone put on a dress to recreate one of Earle's viral TikToks, which is a normal thing to do for a friend and also a normal thing to do for someone you have a crush on, and is therefore useless as evidence and great as content.

That is the whole case. A music video where the script required them to kiss, a flirty-set report from unnamed sources, one dinner, and a denial that fans have decided not to believe. "Uh, no" is doing a lot of work in a lot of group chats right now.

The part nobody's clicking for

Boone also announced he is headlining the inaugural Yours Always Music Festival at the Utah State Fairpark on October 2, which matters if you are a Boone fan in Utah who was annoyed his "Wanted Man" tour skipped Salt Lake City. That tour kicks off July 7. None of this is why "The Time of My Life" is trending, but it happened, so there it is.

For now the official line is that they are friends who made a very romantic video together. The unofficial line is whatever you want it to be. Boone gets the streams either way, which, if you think about it, is the only part of this that was ever guaranteed.