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

When I need you

Of course the first Test against England had to be in Delhi.

Delhi never used to be a very special place for most of Shubman's life. Three years ago, it had become one of the most, especially the airport and a coffee stall just outside the exit gates, which had to be inevitably crossed if you wanted to get into the city.

Shubman dreaded landing hours before he was to land. He couldn't avoid the airport but he certainly could avoid looking at the coffee stall. But when he did get to the exit gates, his ego kicked into play and told him, How can looking at a stupid coffee stall hurt ME?

He glared at it pointedly when he passed it.

It turned out a stupid coffee stall could hurt him, unbearably.

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

Shubman's first Test series as captain was not a disaster, but it might as well have been from the way his mind reacted to it.

He couldn't sleep before any of the matchdays which meant during the first Test, he went five days...well, four, because they won in four days....with barely any sleep.

Every wrong review he took, every wrong field placement he set, every doubt about the team selection plagued him ceaselessly the moment he stepped off the field after the third session. On the field and even during lunch and tea breaks, he overthought of nothing. 

But that was just nine hours per day. 

Nine and half, because the over rate was slow.

Why was the over rate slow? 

Why did I set four slips and no backward third?

Why did I let Bishnoi convince me into the review when Rishabh told me it was too high?

As far as his own batting and fielding was concerned, there weren't too many concerns. None, if you were honest. A huge century in the first innings. Staying not out till the victory in the second innings.

Even when the Feroz Shah Kotla crowd gave him a standing ovation after his 150, Shubman didn't feel like taking his customary bow. And he only did things he wanted to. So he didn't celebrate any of his milestones.

After his 50 in the second innings, Rahul bhai who was batting with him asked, "Why are you, um, refraining from even raising your bat?"

"Because I don't want to," Shubman said.

Rahul bhai gave him a hug and a comforting pat on the back. Shubman was glad he didn't ask anything more on the field. Or off the field. He didn't want to talk about it and he only did things he wanted to.

Fielding on the boundary in India meant a lot more slurs than he had heard in Australia. What made it much worse was that this time they didn't call him names as much as speculate in yells why Ishan Kishan was missing from the squad.

"YOU DUMP THE CAPTAIN, YOU ARE OUT OF THE SQUAD."

"YOU ARE DUMPED BY THE CAPTAIN, YOU ARE OUT OF THE SQUAD."

Some of the taunts were a lot more vulgar. But now they were all related to rifts and break ups and were so much more difficult to ignore than the name-calling in Australia and the crowd chanting Sara's name when he fielded after she'd turned him down, and at one point Shubman seriously considered following Virat bhai's footsteps and giving them the finger.

Virat bhai was twenty three, he reminded himself in time. I am twenty eight.

But God, he had never sympathized more with that action of Virat bhai's.