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

Fly away

Ishan woke up sometime in the middle of the night with a bit of a headache, shivering, with his arm still around Shubman's comfortable warmth.

The first thing he registered was the peace. He'd almost forgotten peace. He didn't remember the last time he'd woken up from slumber without being immediately gripped by turmoil.

Then, he realized Shubman was weeping, very softly.

"Shubi?" Ishan spoke softly too.

Shubman didn't say anything.

"It's me, Shubi. You know you don't have to hide anything from me."

"Go to sleep, Ish."

It hurt unexpectedly hard. But Ishan knew he deserved it.

"You're angry with me," he stated. "I'm....I'm really sorry for the past month, Shubi. You have every right to be angry."

"I'm not angry," sniffled Shubman. "Or I... I am. If you love me even a little bit, how could you cut me off during my first series as...as captain....when you knew, you knew how it was going to be... If my parents loved me even a little bit, how could they fix a marriage for me during my first series as captain when they knew all that was going on? Now I know... I know the kind of love the people I love the most in the world have for me... it's always about them. Their wishes, their whims, their convenience... Never about just being there because I need it."

Maybe being included in this sort of class with Shubman's parents finally broke through Ishan's self control since he walked out of his home. His cheek felt damp against the pillow. He tried to speak steadily.

"I'm sorry, Shubi, I regret so much now...." Ishan's attempt to pull Shubman a bit closer was met with neither encouragement nor discouragement. "When I saw your interview after the series, I realized how...how stupid I'd been not to consider....I'm so sorry, I just wanted to stop loving you...and I couldn't find any...."

"Did you?" asked Shubman.

"Did I...what?"

"Stop loving me?"

"What kind of stupid question-"

"IF YOU DIDN'T STOP LOVING ME, THEN HOW COULD YOU TURN YOUR BACK OVER ONE OF THE MOST DIFFICULT MONTHS OF MY LIFE LIKE MOM AND DAD DID?"

Shubman had shaken Ishan's arms off and sat up, suddenly crying a lot harder.

"Shubi, I'm so sorry-I was so selfish, so selfish...." Ishan sat up too, and cried harder, too. "I wasn't there and I made it worse for you, I didn't realize till I saw the... the interview..."

"Which interview?" Shubman asked.

"The one right before you got the trophy?"

"What was wrong with that interview?" asked Shubman anxiously.

"Nothing to anyone else," mumbled Ishan, "it seems."

Not even to Shubman's parents did it matter how his eyes looked during the interview, how heartbroken he was, all that had mattered to them was taking advantage of Shubman's vulnerability and fix his marriage.

And Ishan couldn't say he had been any better. All that had mattered to him was trying to get over Shubman, not considering what Shubman was going through.

None of it seemed fair on Shubman.

Ishan buried his head in his knees and wished he could stop sobbing and find a better way to apologize. He couldn't bear the sound of Shubman crying. He couldn't ever bear to look at him.