Tom Hiddleston Finally Explains That "I Heart T.S." Tank Top; Insists "Hiddleswift" Was Real

It may seem like a long-forgotten memory, but “Hiddleswift” is indeed a thing we all lived through.

Of course, that all took place when Barack Obama was President of the United States, nobody knew what a ‘Salt Bae’ was and Fifth Harmony still had five members.

Were we ever so young?

Someone who certainly hasn’t forgotten about our brief cultural obsession with ‘Hiddleswift’ is Tom Hiddleston, who has told GQ in no uncertain terms that his relationship with Taylor Swift was actually real, despite all of our suspicions and hilarious jokes.

More pressing than the realness of their heavily publicised relationship, however, are the circumstances that led him to wear an “I Heart T.S.” tank top during their Insta-ready Fourth of July celebrations.

Was it just for the cameras? Hiddleston insists not. He really, really insists not.

“The truth is, it was the Fourth of July and a public holiday and we were playing a game and I slipped and hurt my back,” he said.

“And I wanted to protect the graze from the sun and said, ’Does anyone have a T-shirt?’ And one of her friends said, ’I’ve got this,” referring to the infamous tank top.

“And we all laughed about it. It was a joke.”

As GQ notes, he had much more to say on the matter:

“I have to be so psychologically strong about not letting other people’s interpretations about my life affect my life. A relationship exists between two people. We will always know what it was. The narratives that are out there altogether have been extrapolated from pictures that were taken without consent or permission, with no context. Nobody had the context for that story. And I’m still trying to work out a way of having a personal life and protecting it, but also without hiding. So the hardest thing is that that was a joke among friends on the Fourth of July.”

Believe it or not, he goes on (or as GQ puts it, “he literally cannot stop talking about it.”) You can read the rest here, depending on how much more info you need to believe that the tank top was just a joke “among friends.”

If you're wondering how Swift is handling the fallout from their break-up, here's a snap from a live gig she performed in Houston earlier this week.

Magic✨Madness✨Heaven✨Sin @gettyentertainment @versace_official

A photo posted by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift) on Feb 4, 2017 at 11:57pm PST

Anyway, we’re sure Taylor will share her thoughts on their very real relationship, and perhaps her friends’ apparent collection of “I Heart T.S.” T-shirts, whenever she decides to deliver that new album.

Photo: Instagram (GQ, Taylor Swift)