“I know what people can do to people I love.”
Selena Gomez is thriving professionally—she wept at the Cannes Film Festival this month when her film Emelia Pérez received a nine-minute standing ovation; she went on to win the Best Actress Award at the festival for her role as the film’s titular character.
Gomez was the queen of Cannes this year.
And Gomez is also thriving personally. She’s in love with Benny Blanco, telling TIME in a cover story for the magazine that “he’s not going anywhere any time soon.”
Gomez on the cover of “TIME.”
In the same interview, Gomez opened up about sharing her relationship with Blanco with the public—and “grappling with fans’ reactions to their romance,” People reports.
“I know what people can do to people I love,” she said. “My own fans, who I adore and feel like have shaped who I am, will say the most hurtful things to me about how I live my life. But he has the strength in him that none of that noise fazes him.” She continued “It’s really impressive, and I just cherish every moment with him.”
Gomez’s fans love her, and she them, but they have often been critical of her life, she told “TIME.”
Gomez and Blanco will soon mark their one year anniversary as a couple.
But, Gomez clarified, as happy as she is, Blanco isn’t her only “source of happiness”: “I was alone for five years, and I got really used to it,” she said. “A lot of people are afraid of being alone, and I probably tortured myself in my head for, like, two years being alone, and then I kind of accepted it.”
Gomez also opened up to TIME about her plans to adopt by age 35 if she hadn’t met anyone (Gomez is 31 currently) and said of her relationship with Blanco “It just happens when you least expect it.”
Gomez said she was planning to adopt by 35 had she not met someone.
She also clarified that Blanco was not her only source of happiness.
The two started dating almost a year ago (last June, to be specific, according to People) but had known one another since at least 2019, when they collaborated on the song “I Can’t Get Enough” with Tainy and J Balvin. “In the song’s music video, the pair even shared a sweet scene on an oversized bed, where he dressed as a plush bear and she wore pajamas,” People writes.
