The unlikely pair

5. Tricked

"Do you think Mahi bhai will let me bowl earlier tomorrow?" Bhuvi asked Ishant with a smile. He had been fairly effective today, the first day of the test match against WI. However, his bowling had come after quite sometime.

"How am I supposed to know that?" Ishant irritatedly asked. "Why don't you ask him yourself?"

Bhuvi paused before saying, "As if I could. I wanna bowl earlier tomorrow, though. I hope he makes me."

"Mahi bhai knows better than you, you know?" Ishant grumpily said. "Tu bacha hai toh bacha hi reh. Zyada bada banne ki koshish mat kar."

"I'm sorry, but is something wrong?" Bhuvi furrowed his brows. "I don't remember offending you in any way."

"No you didn't. I'm just stating facts." Ishant said, annoyed. "You think you're all high and mighty just 'cause you did well today. But they still got 250 on board. It doesn't matter though. Because YOU did well. Right?"

Bhuvi looked at him in disbelief. "I didn't mean to sound like that, Ishant, you know I didn't."

"I don't care." Ishant snapped before turning away to call room service.

...

Unable to comprehend the talk they had, Bhuvi found himself out of the room, settled down on the staircase. He wasn't being too full of himself nor did he doubt Mahi bhai in the slightest. He trusted his captain wholeheartedly. It was just an opinion or perhaps a wish which he shared with his friend. Ishant had got it all wrong.

And what's with him calling me a kid? It's not like he's some 50 year old geezer himself. Bhuvi thought reluctantly.

He was lost in his own thoughts, when someone shouted, "BHUVI, CATCH!" And a thing came flying towards him.

Owing to his instant reflexes, Bhuvi caught it.

And screamed.

He threw the thing away, running upstairs in panic, untill he heard a familiar laugh and a hushed voice. He realised what he had caught wasn't a snake, not the real one atleast, but a toy.

"HAHAHAHAHA"

"Shh. Jaddu, not so loud."

"But he ran away!" Jaddu held his stomach pointing towards Bhuvi and a flustered Bhuvi picked up the snake from the ground and threw it at him.

Rohit looked at Bhuvi and couldn't help laughing either.

"What are you guys doing? Going around pranking people?" Bhuvi said, irritatedly.

"Jaddu found a toy snake on terrace." Rohit said.

Jaddu nodded immediately. "Yes, yes. It looks so real too. So I went to Rohit's room to show him."

"Not to show me but to scare me." Rohit corrected him. He then grinned proudly and told Bhuvi. "He failed though."

Before Bhuvi could speak, Jaddu defended himself saying, "I did not! You were scared at first."

"I wasn't scared." Rohit retorted. "I was startled. You barged into my room without knocking."

Jaddu turned to look at Bhuvi. "He's lying."

Rohit rolled his eyes whereas Bhuvi who was quiet till now, said, "And so you decided to pick on others. To make up for your failure."

"Hey, I didn't fail." Jaddu whined

"Yes, that's what he's doing." Rohit nodded, completely ignoring Jaddu's protests.

Bhuvi sighed. "You guys..."