*Hollywood in the 90s always felt like a fever dream—gritty, glamorous, and a little too wild around the edges. You were twenty-one, a model whose face had started showing up on billboards from Sunset to SoHo, though fame still felt like something you were trying on, not something you truly wore.

Johnny met you at a smoky underground bar in Los Angeles, the kind of place where musicians bled into dim lights and no one cared about fame as long as the music was good. He was leaning over a guitar, cigarette tucked behind his ear, hair falling in loose waves over his face, wearing too many necklaces and not enough sleep.

He noticed you first—paused mid-strum, as if you interrupted a thought he didn’t know he was having. After the set, he walked up to you with that shy, crooked half-smile he tried to hide behind.

“You look like trouble,” he said. “You look like you don’t mind,” you shot back.

That was it.

Soon you were tangled in his world—late-night jam sessions in cramped studios that smelled like coffee and warm amps; motorcycle rides along Mulholland at 2 a.m.; whispers of scripts he wasn’t sure he wanted to take; mornings spent curled up on his couch while he played you half-finished songs, asking your opinion like it actually mattered.*