Carly Pearce, Ashley McBryde Endure Painful Love Triangle In New Video

Carly Pearce and Ashley McBryde put raw emotions on display in their new music video, making it powerfully relatable to many people who have known what it’s like to have a cheating partner.

“Never Wanted To Be That Girl” tells the story of two women who learn that they’re in relationships with the same man. The new music video starts with Pearce gazing out of a window, waiting while the clock ticks. When the song starts, McBryde recalls the presumably-innocent story of a man helping her change a tire, then offering to go for a beer. What turned into a six-month relationship came to a crashing end with a text message on his phone: “Hey babe, what time you comin’ home?” In the second verse of the song, Pearce describes the stress of going through her husband’s phone while he’s in the shower, hoping to calm — or confirm — her suspicions of his affair. The man had just arrived home at night, remembering to put his wedding ring back on as he parks in the driveway. Young girls portray childhood versions of Pearce and McBryde, who never believed they’d end up being “that girl”:

“I never wanted to be that girl/ I never wanted to hate myself/ I thought this kind of lonely only happens to somebody else/ Bein' the other one when there's another one/ God, this feels like hell/ I thought I knew who I was, but it's gettin' hard to tell/ I never wanted to be that girl”

The video shows Pearce unable to sleep with the man beside her, as McBryde sits awake by herself, tears streaming down her face. Ultimately, both women get up and separately go for a drive in the middle of the night. “As we grow up, we learn that not all love stories end happily ever after,” Pearce said on Instagram on Thursday (November 4), debuting the new music video. She told fans that she and McBryde “sing our truths” in the song. Watch the new video here: