Not In The Script...

Chapter- 20: Echo

The Melbourne air was colder than he remembered.

Six months had passed, but it still felt like yesterday — that night, that sentence, that door closing. Yash hadn’t knocked again. And Shubman hadn’t reopened.

They hadn’t spoken since.

And now here they were. Same team. Same country. Same room.

But not the same.

Yash was different.

Not visibly — his form was fire, his reflexes sharper, his boundaries on point. But his eyes? They were colder. Especially when they landed on Shubman.

Or didn’t.

Shubman noticed it the first day back.

The way Yash barely acknowledged him in team huddles.

The way he sat two seats apart in buses, choosing silence over proximity.

The way he replied to Shubman’s soft “Hey” in the hallway with nothing but a nod and a vanishing gaze.

It wasn’t anger.

It was distance.

It was indifference painted over old hurt.

And it broke something small inside Shubman every single time.

But Shubman was no better.

He was back in form — technically.

His cover drives still sang. His footwork was precise. His strike rate held steady.

But no one saw the shaking hands under the gloves.

Or the silent panic attacks he fought through in dressing room bathrooms — fingers curled tightly into his scalp, chest tight, vision blurry.

No one saw the small pill bottle zipped inside his kit bag. The anti-anxiety meds he took with water he never sipped from.

He told no one.

Not even Ishan.

Especially not Yash.

He had already lost him. No point dragging his mess back into his orbit.

It was after a win in Sydney that Shubman tried again.

They were walking back into the hotel. Midnight. Streetlights flickering across glass doors.

Shubman fell into step beside Yash. The ache in his chest was quieter these days, but tonight it pulsed.

“Can we talk?” he asked, voice lower than usual.

Yash didn’t pause.

Didn’t even look.

“About what?” he asked, tone casual.

Shubman blinked. “Us.”

“There is no ‘us,’ Gill.”

Shubman flinched.

Yash stopped just before the elevator.

“If you’re looking for closure, write it down in your diary. Don’t hand it to me.”

He stepped in and pressed the button without waiting.

Shubman stood in the hallway for minutes afterward, unmoving.

Later that night, the walls closed in again.

Panic hit him like a tidal wave — no warning, no reason.

He collapsed to the hotel bathroom floor, breath stuttering, hands trembling as he fumbled for the bottle.

Two pills.

Swallowed dry.

He sat on the cold tile for nearly twenty minutes before he could breathe properly again.

His phone buzzed beside him.

----------------------------------------------------------
Ma: "Beta, we’ve spoken to someone. A girl. Sweet, doctor, knows cricket. Just dinner, okay? Talk to her. You can’t live like this forever."
----------------------------------------------------------

He stared at the screen.

Didn’t type anything.

Didn’t call back.

Just laid there. Listening to his own heartbeat, raw and slow.

The next evening, he agreed.

He buttoned his white shirt. Combed his hair. Slid on a watch he hadn’t worn in months.

He wasn’t looking for a future.

He was looking for a distraction.

Something — anything — to silence the noise.

When he stepped into the hotel lobby, the car was already waiting.

He didn’t see Yash at first.

Not until he heard the shuffle of shoes behind him.

He turned slightly.

Yash was walking in from the gym — hoodie loose, towel slung across his shoulder.

For one second, their eyes met.

Yash froze.

So did Shubman.

But neither moved.

And then — as if reminding himself why he was here — Shubman turned back and walked toward the door.

Yash’s mouth opened. Closed. Then opened again.

The words came out as a whisper, cracked and breathless:

“Don’t do this.”

But Shubman didn’t stop.

Didn’t flinch.

Didn’t turn around.

He walked out.

Got into the car.

And left.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
[End of Chapter 20]