From the album everyone for ten minutes
This song treats the van like a lifeboat, but Antonoff knows it's actually a holding pattern. The kids who pile into it aren't escaping their shadows—they're driving around with them, calling it freedom because at least they're not alone. That line 'there's no getting over it' lands hardest when you realize the whole song is about people who chose motion over healing.
We started to fly, then she got sick / Pulled up and down and spun out real quick
The song never names who got sick or what that means, but it fractures the timeline—'we started to fly' becomes past tense the second illness enters. The van was supposed to be the escape vehicle, but someone's body had other plans.
All Jersey kids, we never learn to pump gas / So we sat there with the soundtrack
Jersey law means attendants pump your gas, so these kids literally don't know how to fuel their own getaway car. They're stuck waiting at a Wawa while Blue Magic plays, which is maybe the most accurate metaphor for suburban kids trying to outrun home—you can't even operate the thing that's supposed to save you.
There's no getting over it / So we drove back from the west with our new religion
Antonoff admits the grief doesn't resolve, then immediately pivots to 'new religion' like belief can substitute for healing. The contradiction is the point—he knows you can't outrun it, so you just keep driving and call that faith.
Saw her standing on a rooftop / She said, 'I just don't wanna be lonely'
The rooftop puts her above him, outside the van, but she's saying the same line he's been singing the whole song. Everyone's trying to escape loneliness through proximity, but the song never shows anyone actually connecting—just a lot of people saying the same thing in different parking lots.
That's the thing about loving your shadow
This line reframes the whole song. The narrator thinks he's been running from his shadow, but 'loving your shadow' means he's been chasing the very loneliness he claims to flee. The van didn't take him anywhere new—it just kept the feeling familiar.
The song ends with two people on a rooftop saying the same line to each other, which is either connection or just loneliness in stereo. Antonoff never resolves it, and that refusal feels more honest than a clean ending. You finish the song understanding that the van was never going to save anyone—it just gave them somewhere to sit while the years went slow.