This was it. This was the feeling he’d been chasing for months, the one he thought he’d lost forever. The afternoon sun cut through the high, grimy windows of the auto shop, catching motes of dust in its golden shafts and turning them into a lazy, glittering cosmos. Here, amidst the scent of motor oil and hot metal, Leaf felt a profound and blissful sense of focus, a quiet humming in his veins that matched the thrum of the tools around him. His stylus moved with a life of its own, gliding across the smooth surface of his tablet with a deftness he hadn’t felt in an age.
The garage had become his sanctuary, its rhythm the perfect soundtrack for his resurrected creativity. The distant, percussive whir of an impact wrench was a backbeat, the low murmur of a classic rock station a steady melody. Most importantly, there was the solid, grounding presence of Rowen working on a car hoisted high on a lift nearby. The occasional clink of a dropped wrench or the satisfied grunt as a bolt gave way were all part of the symphony that was finally, finally breaking his creative block.
Every few minutes, Leaf would allow himself a glance, a small, stolen sip of inspiration. He’d watch the focused line of Rowen’s jaw, the controlled strength in his arms as he maneuvered a heavy part into place, or the way his brow furrowed in concentration. Each observation felt like a vital ingredient, a missing color added to his palette. He was certain this strange, symbiotic arrangement—his quiet artistry fueled by Rowen’s tangible labor—was the fated solution to every problem that had been suffocating him.
The light shifted, catching the sharp line of Rowen’s shoulders and the dark fabric of his work shirt in a way that made Leaf’s breath catch. It was a perfect composition of light and shadow, industry and form, and he needed a better angle to capture it. Lost in the moment, he shifted on his metal stool, scraping its legs against the concrete floor to get the perspective just right. He was so absorbed in the artistic problem that he failed to notice the base of the stool nudging the leg of a tall, grease-stained shelving unit.
The unit was a chaotic monument to mechanical entropy, laden with discarded parts, heavy tools, and forgotten components. High on its top shelf, pushed to the very edge, sat a discarded flywheel. It was a solid, heavy disc of machined steel, a dense circle of potential energy gathering dust. Unseen and unnoticed, Leaf’s small adjustment had sent a tiny vibration up the metal frame, a final invitation to gravity.
The wobble was almost imperceptible at first, a slight tremor in the heavy disc. Then, with the silent certainty of physics, the tremor became a tilt. Time seemed to stretch and thin, a held breath before a fall, as the dark shape detached from the shelf. There was no scrape, no warning sound to break the garage’s ambient hum. There was only the swift, indifferent descent of dead weight arcing through the dusty air.
It was aimed directly at the spot where Leaf sat, head bowed over his tablet, completely lost in his artistic trance.
Rowen saw it from across the shop, a flash of dark movement in his periphery that registered as wrong, fast, and dangerous. There was no time to process, no time to form a word of warning that could travel across the wide space. He moved on pure, unthinking reflex, an explosive burst of kinetic energy. His boots slammed against the concrete as he covered the distance in three impossibly long strides, a blur of motion against the sunlit haze.
He didn’t try to catch it; he knew the weight and the velocity would be too much. Instead, he aimed for Leaf. He slammed into him with the force of a linebacker, a controlled impact that was all muscle and momentum. The shove sent Leaf flying from the stool, a tangle of surprised limbs and a startled yelp.
A split second later, the flywheel met the floor.
The impact was a deafening, echoing CLANG that seemed to shake the very foundations of the building. It wasn’t just a noise; it was a physical shockwave that vibrated up through the soles of their feet. The sound reverberated off the high metal ceiling, silencing the radio and the distant tools. Where the disc of steel had landed, a starburst of cracks radiated from a fresh, deep chip in the concrete—a stark, violent punctuation mark exactly where Leaf’s head had been moments before.
Sprawled on the grimy floor, Leaf gasped for air, the wind knocked clean out of him. His ears rang with the ghost of the impact, a high-pitched whine that drowned out everything else. Rowen was half-crouched over him, his chest heaving as he panted, his hand still pressed flat and heavy against Leaf’s chest where he had pushed him. Waves of pure adrenaline seemed to radiate from him, a frantic energy that was entirely at odds with his usual unshakeable calm.
“Are you okay?” Rowen’s voice was rough, a raw, gravelly sound laced with a genuine panic that sliced right through the ringing in Leaf’s ears. His eyes, usually so steady and placid, were wide and wild, scanning Leaf’s face, his arms, his body for any sign of injury. The stoic mask he wore for the world was gone, completely shattered by the near-disaster, and in its place was something raw and unguarded.
But Leaf wasn’t processing the danger. He wasn’t thinking about the chipped concrete or the heavy piece of metal lying nearby. His entire world had compressed to a single point of contact: the solid weight of Rowen’s hand on his sternum. It felt like an anchor in a dizzying sea, the frantic beat of his own heart a drum against Rowen’s palm.
This wasn’t just a rescue; it was a confession. In the distorted, romantic logic of Leaf’s mind, this was a primal, non-verbal declaration that transcended words. The raw concern on Rowen’s face wasn’t just shock; it was the terror of nearly losing someone precious. The world narrowed to the searing warmth of that touch, the panicked look in those dark eyes, and the breathless awe swelling in his own chest.
“You… you saved me,” he managed to whisper, the words barely audible.
The sight of Leaf, physically unharmed and staring up at him with wide, dazed eyes, seemed to drain the adrenaline from Rowen’s system. The frantic energy receded, and his usual pragmatism began to settle back over his features like a mask being lowered into place. He took a deep breath, his own heart rate visibly slowing, and stood up, running a hand through his short, dark hair.
He glanced from Leaf on the floor to the offending chunk of metal, then back to Leaf. “Dude, it’s just a flywheel. It’s not that big of a deal,” he said, his voice regaining its normal, steady tone, all traces of panic erased. He offered a hand down to help Leaf up, his expression settling into one of mild, practical concern. “Just… be more careful where you put your stool, okay?”
The casual dismissal should have been a splash of cold water, a jarring return to reality. It should have shattered the beautiful, fragile narrative Leaf had constructed in the span of thirty seconds. But his mind, already committed to its own script, instantly reframed the words, twisting them to fit his delusion. He’s downplaying it, the thought sang through him, a giddy, thrilling certainty. He’s too stoic, too manly to admit how terrified he was for me. He can’t show that kind of vulnerability.
He took Rowen’s offered hand, the calloused grip sending another jolt of electricity straight up his arm. The strength in that hand wasn’t just practical; it was protective, possessive. As Rowen pulled him effortlessly to his feet, Leaf felt like he was being lifted into a whole new reality, one where his most secret hopes were not just possible, but proven fact. For the rest of the afternoon, he couldn’t focus on his art. His stylus lay forgotten as his mind replayed the moment again and again, polishing it, editing it, until it shone like a pivotal scene from a romance novel—the definitive, irrefutable proof that his feelings were not only seen, but fiercely, heroically reciprocated.
That night, back in the cluttered safety of his apartment, Leaf was buzzing. A frenetic, live-wire energy coursed through him, making it impossible to sit still. The memory of the day was a bright, burning ember in his chest, and the ghost of Rowen’s handprint seemed to tingle on his skin. He paced the worn floorboards of his small living room, from the leaning tower of art books to the window overlooking the streetlights, clutching his phone like a holy relic.
He needed to give voice to the monumental event. He needed to have his new reality validated, to hear it spoken aloud by the people who knew him best. With trembling fingers, he speed-dialed his group chat with Felix and Jude. When the familiar double-beep signaled they had both picked up, he launched into his story without even a hello, the words tumbling out of him.
“You are not going to BELIEVE what happened!” he blurted, his voice high with excitement. He recounted the flywheel incident, but not as it had happened. In his telling, the event was transformed through a lens of breathless, artistic embellishment. He described Rowen’s movement not as a desperate, reflexive lunge, but as a ‘panther-like surge of protective grace.’ He painted the entire scene as a dramatic, fated turning point, a moment where their unspoken connection was forged in the crucible of near-tragedy. Crucially, he omitted Rowen’s pragmatic and dismissive follow-up comments entirely.
Felix’s voice shrieked with pure, unadulterated delight through the phone’s speaker, a sound of glorious validation. “Oh my god, Leaf! This is it! This is the heroic sacrifice! He physically put his body between you and danger! It’s canon, Leaf, it’s officially canon!” The words were exactly what Leaf wanted to hear, a perfect mirror of his own elation.
But then Jude’s voice cut through the excitement, dry and tired as old paper. “Let me get this straight. You were clumsy, you knocked a shelf, and something almost fell on you.” There was a pause. “And Rowen, being a decent human being who was standing right there, pushed you out of the way?”
Leaf’s soaring elation deflated, just slightly. The practical, step-by-step breakdown felt like sacrilege. “It was more than that! Jude, you didn’t see the look in his eyes! He was terrified… for me.”
A heavy sigh crackled over the line, a sound freighted with a concern that Leaf found deeply irritating. “Leaf, I’m glad you’re not a pancake. Seriously, I am,” Jude said, his tone softening a little, but not nearly enough. “But that’s what friends do. That’s what anyone would do. They stop you from becoming a pancake.” The conversation ended a few moments later, with Felix still offering breathless congratulations and Jude offering quiet, worried platitudes.
Leaf hung up feeling a flicker of annoyance, a sour note in his otherwise perfect day. Jude just didn’t get it. He couldn’t see the poetry, the subtext, the sheer romantic weight of the moment. But the annoyance didn’t seed doubt. Instead, it hardened into resolve, strengthening his conviction to believe his own, far more beautiful version of the truth.
—
Experience the slow-burn, heart-wrenching story of Leaf, a digitally blocked artist, and his deeply complicated friendship with Rowen in The Art of Unrequited. This emotional contemporary romance and slice-of-life tale explores unrequited love, personal growth, and creative inspiration, perfect for fans of fiction, slow-burn romances, friends-to-lovers tension, and character-driven storytelling. Click here to read the whole story.
