Climb Every Mountain, With You (Shubman Gill x Ishan Kishan)

The apprehension

The lifting of the Border Gavaskar trophy had supposed to be a happy thing to do. Shubman, the undebated star of the series, was supposed to be happy, even if Ishan couldn't be.

But from the moment Rishabh took the winning single, Ishan saw all of Shubman's normalcy crumble. 

His Man of the Series interview had none of the confidence his earlier two Man of the Match interviews had had. Ishan could almost detect the tremour in his voice. It made him shockingly dejected.

He had been unable to keep himself together even when Shubman was being normal. If Shubman broke, there was no hope for him.

When everyone went to give Shubman congratulatory hugs after the award ceremony, Ishan caught himself, remembering the BCCI chairman's command.

Maintain a respectable distance on the FIELD at the very least.

But try as he might, he could not move his eyes away from Shubman. His shoulders were slumped. He looked as if some terrifying creature was overcoming his resistance bit by bit every minute.

Even if no one else could, Ishan could see Shubman falling apart in front of his eyes.

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

Maybe Shubman thought Ishan hadn't seen it.

When they were leaving for the Perth airport, he said lightly, "I wish the flight was a day later."

"You wish you never had to take the flight at all," Ishan pointed out.

Shubman laughed, nervously.

"Always see through me, don't you?" Shubman's smile dropped. "Well, you were right. Maybe I was in denial. Maybe I was pretending we'd never have to board this flight. I wasn't strong at all."

But Ishan found him stronger than ever. 

He'd felt over the past month Shubman actually didn't grasp the magnitude of the disaster, but now it was clear he had grasped it, but he had mastered it and kept it locked inside his head for the Border Gavaskar Trophy.

No wonder he was the world's best cricketer.

"I'm proud of you," Ishan said. "I wish I was like you, Shubi. And you know imitation is the sincerest form of flattery."

Shubman's smile came back for a bit. "I don't wish you were like me," he said with his familiar wicked wink. "I think it would have been disastrous."

It hadn't been fair for Ishan to blame Shubman about not taking the cameras seriously the other day.

If all this mess hadn't happened, Ishan would have kissed him right there in the airport too.

The ways you were taught some lessons by life were unfortunately large in magnitude, it seemed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

Shubman had freaked out completely over the long flight journey back. Ishan had resorted to making him repeat Thor's dialogues, an age old technique that never failed.

"Brother, however I have wronged you, whatever I have done that has led you to do this, I am truly sorry," Ishan whispered softly in Shubman's ears, holding him tightly.  

"But these people are innocent, taking their lives will gain you nothing," Shubman mumbled. 

"So take mine, and end this."

"I wish we could end this," said Shubman. "All this stupid trouble."

"So do I," said Ishan.

Their arrival in Delhi with the trophy was hailed with cheers, but they were not unmarred with the petty comment here and there.

The one that hit Ishan the most was, "That's a men's cricket tournament you're returning from! Keep it restricted to men and go play women's cricket!"

Rahul bhai whispered something to one of their guards. Ishan got no satisfaction in seeing the guy who'd shouted being dragged away from their sight. Shubman didn't seem to have heard at all.

Most of them had connecting flights to their hometowns in a few hours.

Shubman took Ishan's arm in a shaky grasp and led him to one of the exit doors. Without stepping out, they could see the coffee stall, their coffee stall.

"We'll wrap this thing up with our parents in a week or two and come back here," said Shubman.

Ishan wanted to ask, Aren't you being stupidly optimistic?

Instead he said, "Definitely."