Kayla Nicole’s Halloween costume sparked more conversation than most trick-or-treat displays.
On October 31, the media personality dressed as Toni Braxton in the singer’s “He Wasn’t Man Enough” music video, recreating some of the signature scenes and lip-sync moments from the R&B classic.
She posted a video on Instagram that synced her footage with clips from the original music video, along with the song’s well-known lyrics about a former partner and the woman he moved on with.
Fans immediately connected the performance to her former relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, who is now engaged to Taylor Swift.
The lyric choice alone was enough to raise eyebrows, especially given the timeline. Nicole and Kelce dated on and off for five years before their 2022 breakup. Swift and Kelce began dating a year later and confirmed their engagement in August 2025.
During an episode of her Dear Media podcast earlier that week, Nicole clarified the inspiration behind her costume, according to Us Weekly. She said she was thinking of a specific memory from childhood: “I had a white best friend. Her name was Taylor.”
Nicole explained that Toni Braxton’s music was playing in the car with her friend’s family, and that memory stuck with her. “It was an ‘a-ha’ moment,” she said, describing the realization that “white people listen to Black people music as well.” Nicole emphasized that the reference was about that Taylor, not Swift.
However, some fans didn’t buy the explanation. The timing of the costume came shortly after Swift released her latest album, The Life of a Showgirl, which included the song “Opalite.”
Many listeners believed the track contained a reference to Nicole. In one verse, Swift sings about someone who was “in it for real” while the other was “in her phone.” The line was seen as a callback to an old clip of Kelce asking Nicole to put her phone down during a date.
This is not the first time Kayla Nicole has used Halloween to respond to a breakup. After ending things with former NBA player Iman Shumpert, she once dressed as Teyana Taylor for the holiday, according to For The Win. That costume prompted reactions at the time as well, as Shumpert later married Taylor.
The latest Halloween moment set off a wave of online attention. Swift’s fanbase, known as the Swifties, who are notorious for their highly active digital presence, began circulating resurfaced tweets from Nicole’s old Twitter account.
The posts, dating back to the early 2010s, included offensive language described by users as racist, homophobic, sexist, and ableist.
By Thursday, November 6, Nicole’s X account had been deleted entirely.