One Last Time x Shubman Gill | ✔️

16

Chapter 16

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||Aarohi||

"Here" I give Shubman the glass of milk which we were gonna have with the cookies we just baked. He took the glass without looking at me.

"So?" I asked.

"So?" he repeated.

I sighed loudly which made him look at me. "What happened? Are you ok? Do we need to go to the doctor?" he immediately asked.

I hold his hand before he could spill the milk and said,"I'm fine and don't try to change the subject!" This time he sighed loudly,"I'm not trying to change the subject Aarohi, I'm genuinely worried."

Oh. Okay.

"Let's not ruin the mood Aarohi, this is really not something you wanna know about, trust me." he said in a tired voice. His voice almost made me give up but then the sight of him not being able to play even a single shot flashed in my mind.

"Shubman, you said you're genuinely worried about me. Why?" I asked slowly not trying to put too much pressure on the conversation.

He instantly answered,"Cause you're my friend." I smiled at him saying,"Exactly. You're worried about me because you are my friend. In the same way I'm also worried about you. Sometimes in life there are things which come out as hard for sharing it with people who are closest to you, however they comparatively feel easy to share with a stranger."

At the word stranger he looked at me with the look which clearly indicated that he wasn't understanding my point and I feared I might ruin all the progress we had made in the past few days, but still continued,"No, I didn't mean we are strangers. But we aren't even best of friends either."

"Shut up" he said with a tone as if he really didn't want this conversation to continue so I decided to drop it. To brighten the mood I laughed and said,"By the way you can tell me about it if you want, it's not like I'm gonna tell anyone since I'm dying soon so-"

When I noticed that Shubman didn't join the laugh I stopped mid sentence and looked at him. He looked at me angrily and said,"Don't you dare say that. I'm not spending so much time with you so that you can suddenly leave me one day like others did. You're not going anywhere, you're not gonna die! Got it?"

I shifted my position and directly faced him,"Be practical Shubman. I hardly have a month and-"

"I killed her" he cut me off.

"Huh?" was all that managed to come out of my mouth.

There are three possibilities. First, maybe he wanted me to shut up. Second, maybe he just wanted to end this conversation so he blurted out whatever came in his mind. And lastly third, maybe he wanted the mood to be light again so he joked.

Third one doesn't seem like his style but at this point I can't really say what he does and what he doesn't.

He nodded and with shame in his eyes he looked down saying,"It's true. Do you wanna know about it?"

No. Yes. I don't know.

I didn't say anything for a while so he scoffed. "See, this was the reason I didn't want to go anywhere close to this conversation."

"What do you mean?" I asked genuinely confused.

His lips perked up a bit as if he was used to people getting close to him but not close enough to actually listen to him, actually understanding him.

"Shubman tell me."

Even though I asked him to tell me, I wasn't really sure if I wanted to know. Yes, I wanted to know about it because I was worried, but no, I wasn't sure if I would be able to look at him the same way again. I wasn't sure if I could handle it.

"She died because of my dream." he spoke in a very low voice. If it wasn't just the two of us and the pin drop silence I don't think I would hear that. It looked like he was having a hard time forming sentences, but I waited patiently for him to continue.

"My sister had cancer. Everyone in my family knew, except me. They didn't tell me because they didn't want me to get distracted due to it. My family wasn't rich that could afford both, my cricket as well as her medical expenses."

"Shubman"

"I killed her Aarohi. I killed my own sister just because I was selfish behind a sport."

"Shubman"

"If it wasn't for my stupid dream she would be here right now, with me"

I tried to get his attention by calling out his name but it looked like he was not able to listen any of it. He kept on blaming himself, he looked vulnerable. I felt bad looking at him in such a condition. It was my first time looking at him with so much emotion.

"Shubman" I said this time a little loud while cupping his face in my palms with a hope to get him out of the trance.

His eyes met mine and he said,"You hate me"

I shook my head and without breaking eye contact I said,"No I don't. And I don't think I'll ever hate you."

"Why?"

I smiled softly at him,"It's not your fault. You didn't knew. Death isn't in your control. I have cancer and my dad has spent so much money on me with a hope that I'll get better, but I'm not. I'm still dying. Even if your family had made the opposite choice it wasn't certain that the result would be the one you'll were hoping for. You can't blame yourself for some thing's which aren't in your control."

"But I didn't get to say her a goodbye for the last time." he said with his eyes shining, there were tears in his eyes.

I asked in a low voice,"Why not?"

"She died the day we won our world cup"

Now I understand why The Shubman Gill who became a promising player in the world cup suddenly got out of form.

"She might have died with a happy heart." I said smiling at him.

"Why?" he asked.

"Because of the exact reason you hate yourself. Your cricket. You won the world cup. She obviously made your family choose your cricket and not her health. She would be so content when she came to know about how amazingly you played the entire time and when you won the cup, she would have thought that it was worth it, that her choice was not wrong."

"Really? Do you think so?"

"Yes. I'm sure about it." I said assuring him. Right now I just wanted him to stop hating himself because he was a human too. How can he handle this big truth just to himself. I understand it's not easy to share it with anyone let alone me, but I really wished he would have done it sooner with any of his best friends. Adding cherry on the top, his ex girlfriend who had such an important place in his life left him wounded.

"Let's eat these" I motioned at the cookies we had baked earlier.

He looked at those but didn't initiate so I took one and took a bite.

"Shubman?"

"Ya?"

"I think we used salt instead of sugar"