We’re Finally Hearing About Whitney Houston’s Real Relationship with Girlfriend Robyn Crawford

For decades, the public had speculated about Whitney Houston‘s real relationship with longtime friend Robyn Crawford. 2018’s Whitney confirmed their romantic involvement, but details were scarce without Crawford’s involvement in the project. Now, Houston’s girlfriend Crawford is detailing their romantic relationship in a new memoir, seven years after the singer’s death.

Crawford’s new book, A Song For You: My Life with Whitney Houston, gets deeply personal about what she and Houston meant to each other, and how their relationship changed over the years. They first met as teens at a New Jersey summer camp, where Crawford says there was an instant attraction. Upon seeing 16-year-old Houston, she told her. right away: “I’m going to look out for you.”

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As Houston’s career took off, Crawford kept that promise. The two grew incredibly close, entering a romantic relationship without discussing what it meant. “We never talked about labels, like lesbian or gay,” Crawford writes in the book. “We just lived our lives and I hoped it could go on that way forever.”

Elsewhere in the book, she describes it like this: “We wanted to be together, and that meant just us.”

But in 1982, Houston told Crawford she needed a change. “She said we shouldn’t be physical anymore, because it would make our journey even more difficult,” Crawford reveals, “She said if people find out about us, they would use this against us. And back in the ’80s that’s how it felt.”

Houston wasn’t just facing pressure from the public. Her family was against her relationship with Crawford too: “Whitney told me her mother said it wasn’t natural for two women to be that close,” Crawford explains, “but we were that close.”

Whitney Houston’s Best Friend Robyn Crawford Breaks Her Silence on Their Love Affair in New Memoir https://t.co/bR0foPOYcI

— People (@people) November 6, 2019

The singer marked her decision to stop being physical with Crawford by giving her then-girlfriend a blue Bible. Crawford had no choice and swore herself to secrecy about the true nature of her relationship with Houston. “I kept it safe,” she writes in her memoir. “I found comfort in my silence.”

Of course, not even their silence could prevent the years of speculation that followed. But even after Houston’s death, Crawford kept her silence — until now.

“I’d come to the point where I felt the need to stand up for our friendship…I felt an urgency to stand up and share the woman behind the incredible talent,” she says of her decision to finally open up. “I wanted to lift her legacy, give her respect and share the story of who she was before the fame, and in that, to embrace our friendship.”

So, how does Crawford think of their relationship now? “Whitney knows I loved her and I know she loved me,” Crawford writes. “We really meant everything to each other.”

A Song For You: My Life with Whitney Houston comes out November 12, 2019.