In Taylor Swift’s “august,” the narrator longs for James.
James is the 17-year-old boy at the center of Folklore’s fictional love triangle. He is already connected to Betty, but he has a brief summer romance with the unnamed narrator of “august.”
The song presents the relationship from the other girl’s perspective. She hopes the romance might become permanent, while the story ultimately shows that James returns to Betty after the summer ends.
The character can be confused with the narrator herself, who is sometimes informally called Augustine or Augusta by fans. Those names describe the unnamed female character; James is the boy whose attention she wants.