Rules of the Game

Sunny

I cannot cancel yet another meeting with Neelam, and I cannot find yet another fault with the potential date. I have to commit to a date, or drop the idea altogether. Neelam's patience with my lame excuses is running low. Tonight. I will bring it up tonight.

The last few months have been tough but I am happy going through them with Shaan. I have struggled to switch between the aggressive nature of the opener, and the strategic nurturing mind of the captain. Nature doesn't waste anything, and I have grown a lot these two months. I have to give myself time to process it all. "Be kind to be yourself" as Shaan reminds me frequently. The fans have been kinder than I had expected, and I suspect it had a lot to do with the Sunny they see when I am around Shaan. I miss him terribly. I haven't seen him, touched him since our game together at the start of the season. The distance of a three hour flight might as well be a light year.

I pick up my phone on the first ring.

"Hi Meri Jaaaaan, whacha doing?" Shaan is chirpy as ever.

"I was waiting for your phone call..."

"That's a lot of pressure on me. I don't do well with neediness," is his immediate response.

Ouch! He is the independent sort and I like that about him, "I was joking. I was getting ready for bed, and deciding if I should call you or will you be on the phone with your mum."

We share the latest news and gossip. We celebrate my team pulling through to keep the playoff hopes alive. We discuss his supreme form but his team's dismiss performance. We talk about our mother's and the upcoming Mother's Day.

"I just want to go home for Mother's Day."

I agree, "Me too. I want to take you home for Mother's Day. I want to tell her how happy you make me." Shaan is silent in the other side. Maybe that was too emo. I try to recover, "I mean if it was possible for you to come on Mother's Day...and if you wanted to come. Any other day would also work. Doesn't have to be Mother's Day."

"Sunny...I hope to do that one day. I hope we have that moment together." Tomorrow, I am going to pray at the nearest temple or gurdwara or any religious place to make this dream a reality.

"So...did you sleep better last night after our phone call?" He changes the subject to less fraught topics.

"Like a baby."

"That explains the hundred, and keeping the playoff hopes alive," we both laugh.

Last night I had called Shaan at midnight complaining that I can't sleep. We had found a medicine that involved some mutual heavy breathing on the phone. "Next time let's try video," I suggest.

Shaan loves to talk, and our conversation heads in fifty different directions. I add my aa-han every so often as I prepare for bed. He is getting sleepy and I am running out of time to talk about the potential date. So I man up, "Hey babe, I wanted to talk to you about something important." He goes silent in the middle of some random story he was telling me but forgetting half the details as sleep overwhelmed him. His voice is fully alert when he says, "I am listening."

"I am...considering...something."

"What?"

"You know how these rumors just don't die. The Stans keep feeding the everyone new material. Plus the situation with your team. I was thinking...maybe I can do something to move the attention away from us. Like...," I try to find the right metaphor, "throwing water on the fire."

"Okay. How?"

"Neelam has been pointing out that I have no dating record which makes it easier for people to assume things. She was suggesting that I go on a...dinner or something. Give people something else to talk abou," he cuts me off.