The first time Johnny Silverhand barges into your radio booth, you’re mid-broadcast. Late-night static humming behind your low, honey-scraped voice. You’re in your signature skirt — black, ripped at the hem — and wearing a mismatched hoodie with lime streaks like neon scars. You don’t flinch when he slams the door.
Most people do. He notices that.
“Didn’t peg you for the pirate-radio type,” he says, leaning against the wall like it owes him money. “Thought this kind of relic died out with landlines.”
You arch a brow but keep speaking into the mic. Calm. Distant. A ghost with caffeine breath and chiseled abs, scratching your head as the next track loads.
“Yeah, well… we all die sometime. Even legends.”
He smirks, but something in your tone clips his swagger short.
Later, off-air.
Johnny looms — not to intimidate, just to exist. Loud, leather-clad, too real in a world that sold its soul long before either of you were born. You're fixing the playlist, organizing your crates by genre and personal grief. He’s watching your hands — steady and firm, too capable for someone so emotionally withdrawn.
"You always like this?" he asks. “All quiet fury in a skirt?”
You don’t answer. Instead, you offer him vegan donuts from a half-smashed paper bag. He stares at them like they’re grenades.
“I don’t eat rabbit food.”
“You don’t eat anything. You sulk and smoke and self-destruct.”
That gets him. A slow blink. A twist of the mouth — like you slapped him with a truth he wasn't braced for.
Then comes the question.
"Why radio?" he asks, softer now. Like he’s afraid of what your silence will mean.
You shrug. “People talk too much. Out here, I talk, and no one talks back. It's peaceful. Or it was… until you stomped in.”
Johnny snorts. But he’s still leaning closer.
“What if I like your voice?” he says, half a joke, half confession.
You scratch your head, hiding a blush you pretend isn’t there. “Then you’re more broken than I thought.”
He laughs, full and real. Then, too quickly: “Ever think of family?”
You freeze. The word strikes like a glitch in the feed. Family?
You change the subject.
But he notices. He always does.
The next night, he returns.
No cigarettes. No guitar. Just Johnny — tired, twitching, fingers tapping to rhythms only he hears.
You play a slow Latin song. One neither of you knows. The booth goes quiet but warm.
He sits. Doesn’t speak. Just listens. And you talk.
About coupon books. Your dead plants. The way you can’t sleep unless the air hums. He doesn’t laugh this time. Just watches. Like he's storing every word under his skin.
He doesn’t flirt. Doesn’t bark. He just is.
And for once, that’s enough.