Did You Know Me? (Shubman Gill x Ishan Kishan)

Nisha's trigger warnings

Shubman pushed his luck by walking Sara up to her room, and as they stood in the corridor, still talking, he probably would have pushed his luck further till Sara's mother or father looked out. Till he suddenly remembered.

Nisha!!

Oh god, she had been due to arrive that afternoon....

Shubman grabbed his phone and found a bunch of missed calls from her. And his phone was on silent.

"Shit," he muttered.

"Is something wrong?" asked Sara.

"Shit, shit, shit. My friend came to Ahmedabad earlier, I was supposed to receive her...."

Sara facepalmed. "I hope she made it to the hotel through all this media crowd. You have a terrible memory, Shub."

When you're around, yes.

Shubman wanted to hit himself.

"See you later," he said, before he ran down the corridor, dialling Nisha on his phone.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nisha looked quite at ease in Ishan's room, reclining against the pillows when Shubman burst in, panting.

"I'm so sorry, Nish, I'm so sorry-"

"Save your breath," said Nisha drily. "Neither of us expected any better from you anyway."

"I'm so sorry...."

"All right!" said Nisha. "It's not like I'm going to walk out of here because you forgot about me, nor like you can go back in time and try to keep your head in place even if Sara was attending the ceremony."

Chastened, Shubman glanced at Ishan, who shook his head in disappointment.

"Thank you for showing her in," he said.

"Wow, now we go into formalities after you ditch your friend," said Ishan.

"I'll make it up to her," Shubman promised. "Come on, Nisha...."

Nisha got up. She reached for her suitcase, but Shubman decided to be polite and take it from her, only to get back a glare from his friend.

"All right," he said, surrendering. "Take the suitcase all by yourself."

"Good night, Ishan," said Nisha.

Shubman kissed Ishan on the head. "Good night, baby," he cooed.

Ishan exhaled in an irritated manner. "Good night, idiot."

"Good night, my idiot," corrected Shubman.

Ishan must have tried to hold back the smile, but the corner of his mouth lifted.

"Good night, my idiot," he repeated.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"I think you're playing with fire," said Nisha.

"Meaning?"

"This drama you're carrying on with Ishan. I think it's going to misfire horribly."

"I don't know what drama you're even talking about," Shubman said with a sigh. "These cheesy nicknames? They're jokes, Nisha. Virat bhai calls Rahul bhai Rahuliya. Now you tell me if ours aren't more normal."

"They would be normal for an actual couple, but acting like a couple almost always ends badly, Shubman!" Nisha shouted. "The only way it can end nicely if they end up becoming a couple, but what if only one person falls for the other one, what do you think is going to happen then?"

Shubman could not imagine what was getting her so worked up.

"Calm down-"

"CALM DOWN? DO YOU EVER THINK BEFORE YOU ACT, SHUBMAN? YOU FLIRTED WITH ME FOR LIKE A WEEK IN HIGH SCHOOL AND I STILL CAN'T GET OVER YOU. EVER. NOW YOU FLIRT WITH EVERYONE YOU SEE, DO YOU EVER THINK OF WHETHER IT AFFECTS THEM? DO YOU EVER THINK OF ANYONE BUT YOURSELF?"

Shubman felt exactly like she had slapped him across the face.

"Look, I'm sorry," he said. "I'm sorry I forgot your flight landed here in the afternoon.... I know I've been a-um, a jerk to you very often...."

"It's not just about me," said Nisha impatiently. Shubman was relieved that she had stopped screaming, at least. "You act like a jerk to a lot of people."

"You think so?" asked Shubman uncertainly.

"Well.... yes, but it's okay because you never mean to be one, and as Ishan and I were discussing, you've probably got more goodness inside you than most people who don't act as jerks, so, yeah..."

Shubman couldn't quite take that in a positive way.

"If you think that us becoming a couple isn't possible anytime soon, I think we should stop this-friends with benefits stuff-or whatever we're doing," said Nisha.

Though his heart sank, Shubman nodded. Friends with benefits sounded awful. Specially now that Nisha had said she was unable to get over him, that she actually loved him, what they'd been doing was even more awful than if neither of them had had that sort of feelings involved.

"And if you value my opinion even a little bit, stop the act with Ishan," she added.

Shubman groaned. "You're back to it again. Nisha. ISHAN. IS. MY. BEST. FRIEND. You don't have to worry about us."

Nisha made an uncomplimentary face at him.

"I'd ask you to be the gentleman and take the couch, but since you have a final in three days, I'll take the couch and let you have the bed," she said.

"This is a seven star hotel," said Shubman. "The couch here is more comfortable than the beds back home."

"Celebrities," muttered Nisha.