In this paper, I use narrative methodology to examine and interpret the experiences of Shaun, a 4th grade student in the United States, navigating his own reluctance and disaffection with writing in school -- in a writing workshop that sought to foster language experimentation, choice, and agency. From the perspective of a participant-observer and classroom volunteer, I describe the challenges of my own work with Shaun, emphasizing the twists and turns of Shaun's experience and highlighting especially the relational factors, or "relational narrating," through which he ultimately came to produce writing on his own. The paper conceptualizes writing as a process of "becoming" rather than as final products and endpoints, and the analysis considers the role of "imaginative co-investments" in writing, between peers, as shaping factors supporting writer identity and practice.