•SHUBMAN GILL•

We are currently in the meeting room with a total of 5 people, including myself. The other four are Darshan, Ishan's manager, a man who is probably in his early thirties, from some BCCI department, though I am not quite sure which one, and Nia.

Nia is Darshan's assistant, or let's say she is doing her PR internship under him. She is also a part of the event management team hired by many famous people, especially cricketers.

I can bet that Darshan didn't want to include Nia in this, But Nia being the Drama lover that she is, included herself.

We are all waiting for Ishan to arrive. When I asked his manager, whose name is Akash, about him, he told me that Ishan was out of Delhi at a resort for a short vacation with his friend and returned yesterday.

And now I know for sure Ishan has one more reason to be pissed at me. Not only is he in this mess because of me, but he also had to cut short his vacation because of all this drama. If I were in his position, I would be so mad.

Darshan is busy on his laptop doing God knows what. Nia passed him a coffee cup. He took a swig from the cup without turning his gaze from the laptop. "This is not my usual, it's not strong enough," he says, looking at Nia. She, in turn, looks at me.

A little while ago:

I parked my car and started walking toward the main entrance. Nia was also approaching the main entrance with steady steps, her phone trapped between her ear and shoulder because both of her hands were full. In one hand, she was holding a laptop, tablet, and some files, and in the other hand, she was holding a cup of coffee.

When she saw me, she approached and gave me the coffee cup to hold her phone properly against her ear to talk to whoever she was talking with. The cup was cool against my palm. I took a large sip from it and spat it out as soon as the strong coffee hit my taste buds.

Nia looked at me with wide eyes, my face morphing into an unpleasant expression because of the bitter taste. She hastily cut the call. "Sir, that was for Darshan, sir." Now, my eyes widened.

"Ummm, I thought it was for me," I said, wiping my mouth. I should have guessed already, otherwise, who drinks such bitter coffee? "Do you think he'll notice?" I asked her as she inspected the amount of coffee still in the cup. "Sir, you practically made out with the cup while taking a sip, of course, he will notice," she said, grimacing, "and I don't have time to bring another one."

"Uh... just add some more cold water to it, and it will be full again," I suggested. "And it will be less bitter that way." She gave me an 'are you serious' look and shook her head.

_

I guess she actually considered my advice and added more water to it. "Uh... I think the order got swapped," she says and gives me a look which basically says: See, your idea didn't work.

A few minutes later, the door opens and everyone's heads snap towards its direction. Ishan enters the room. His eyes meet mine, but I don't see any resentment in them towards me, which makes me a bit relaxed. He sits beside me.

"As we all are aware of the mess that got created because of that article," he says, looking directly into my soul. "And this meeting is held to come up with some solution."

"What about suing the media house that published the article?" asks the man whose name I still don't know.

"No, we cannot do that because if we sue them, they can sue us back for defaming them, and they have enough proof about the article being true," Darshan replies in a measured tone.

"Couldn't we just say that the article was fake?" I ask the obvious question.

"No, we can't, Shubman, because the media house that published that is known for giving accurate information," he gives a brief look to his laptop screen and continues, "I tried searching about their background, and they seem spotless."

"Even if they take it down, there are hundreds of other articles reciting the same words, and not just that, people have screenshots, even some fans came forward to tell that they also spotted you two together," Akash states calmly

Ishan and I just sit their listening to them carefully, Ishan does not seem upset with me.

"Your fans have pulled old photos and videos of your interactions with each other," it's Nia. "And they have found something as well."

"What?" asks Ishan, confusion etched on his face. This is the first word he spoke after coming here. "See this," Nia turns her tablet towards us. There is a picture, actually two pictures in one frame. My picture is on the right and Ishan's on the left, and we are wearing the same shirt.

I take a closer look at the shirt and I realize it's not mine; it's actually -

Flashback:

"Kya ho gya tujhe?" asks Virat bhaiya. "My luggage got misplaced, and now I don't have anything to wear for the event," I tell him while whining.

"Your jeans is pretty good," he gives me a once-over look. "Haan bhaiya, but I don't have a shirt for the event," I say. I am wearing a printed tee which is definitely not a good option to wear at a BCCI event, especially when you're a player yourself.

"Take something from Rahuliya, you both share the same height," Rahuliya is Rahul bhaiya as Virat bhaiya loves to call him endearingly.

"Oh, okay, but where is he?" I ask, being clueless about Rahul bhaiya's whereabouts. "He must be in his room," Virat bhaiya tells me his room number.

The door of his room is already open, and he is rummaging through his stuff. "Rahul bhaiya," he looks towards me. "Ah, actually, I don't have anything to wear tonight. Can I borrow something from you?" He smiles at my hesitation. "Of course... wait a minute."

As he starts rummaging through his stuff again, my phone starts ringing, so I step out to answer it. When the call ends, Rahul bhaiya is standing there with a shirt in his hand. "Here, it will look great on you," he says, handing me a blue shirt with half sleeves.

Flashback ends.

The shirt that we both are wearing in this picture is the same one that Rahul bhaiya gave me that day. I glance towards Ishan. He senses my confusion and whispers, "Rahul bhaiya had only one good shirt, and he was going to wear that, so he asked me for something. That's how you ended up wearing my shirt that day."

"Ohh," it's all I'm able to say. I look at the picture again; Ishan's shirt is fitting me so well despite our height and body difference, which is kind of surprising.

"They are considering the pic that was posted by Shubman as a hint," says Akash.

Now it's Ishan's turn to be confused, and now I whisper to him about how that picture got posted on my account, and now it's his turn to say, "Ohh."

The man whose name I didn't bother to ask speaks, "We are already neck-deep in rumors, be it Rohit and Virat's fighting rumor or about the false accusations some of our players faced regarding drugs or be it about match-fixing rumor. All these are ruining the image of BCCI."

He is right; some people actually think that Virat and Rohit bhaiya hate each other, and they don't have any bonding. I mean, come on, whenever any important player of the opponent team gets out during the match, Virat bhaiya runs to hug Rohit bhaiya first. And not just that, they always defend each other in press conferences. Can't people just see that?

"Does anyone have any idea?" asks Darshan, looking at everyone. No one says anything for a whole two minutes.

And in those two minutes, I notice Darshan's socks from under the table. I can see a hint of them from where his trouser ends. And he is wearing floral-printed socks. I am not kidding; he is literally wearing socks with pink flowers on them. I want to laugh now, but I know for sure that if I laugh at this situation, then the distance between Darshan's hand and my neck will close off real quick.

"I have an idea," Nia responds to Darshan's question. Everyone is looking at her curiously. Darshan gives her a quick nod, and she proceeds to tell her idea.

"When I closely look at this matter, I realize that even though this dating news came out in a quite scandalous way, it's receiving a positive response.

Yeah, we have received some homophobic remarks as well, but they got outnumbered by the people who are actually happy or at least okay with them dating.

Last night, they both were trending on X, previously known as Twitter. People are making their edits and fan art.

And when we open the comment section under Shubman sir's post, we can see a lot of positive comments, and there were people who are genuinely curious about the dating thing."

She reads some comments for us:

"Damn, I didn't notice before, but they look so freaking perfect together."

"Omg omg omg, no way these two are dating, they look so cute together."

"Their chemistry is off the charts."

"They share clothes too, how cute."

"I never imagined that I will see two players of ICT dating each other, not that I am complaining."

"Get married already, you two."

"Their height difference is so cute."

"Why did you like all the comments" Darshan ask her looking into her tablet. "Uh.... Whatever I like personally should not be questioned in professional environment" She retorts with sass.

She is even giving heart eyes to both of us, which is kinda baffling to me.

As she was reading the comments, I open my Insta and click on the comments, and the first comment reads:

"Can't believe we are allowing the western virus to enter here. They both should be removed from the ICT."

As I read the comment, Ishan practically flinches, and I regret saying it out loud.

"Please bother to scroll down a little," Nia says, looking at me with a serious expression. "As I said earlier, there are homophobic comments, but they are very few. People are really supportive of you two."

I obey her and look at other comments, and she is right. I can see a lot of positive comments and some neutral ones too, who couldn't care less about our dating life as long as we keep hitting fours and sixes.

"And I also noticed another thing; from last evening, the other rumors related to the players kind of died down, and everyone is talking about this," she scrolls her tablet.

"What are you implying here?" Ishan asks.

"I am implying that people are loving this romantic angle, they want something, so we should give them something,"

I raise my eyebrows, and she continues, "This dating thing is resulting in a positive PR thing, and because of this, people are not dwelling much on negative rumors regarding ICT. So why don't we keep feeding them this romantic angle, which they seem to love?"

"Makes sense," says the BCCI man.

"So you are saying that they should date each other for real?" Akash questions.

"No, they should fake date each other, meaning they are dating only in the public eye, but in reality, they are just teammates,"

"No, this is so wrong," finally, Ishan speaks. "We shouldn't do that."

"This is the only option left, Mr. Kishan," Darshan retorts.

"But we are cricketers, not con artists. We shouldn't do this,"

"Ishan sir, I agree with you, but anything other than this will result in more mess,"

Ishan is now getting frustrated.

~~~

From the next chapter they'll actually start fake dating yaaayyyyy.

ISHAN ENTERS THE MEETING ROOM
HIS MIND :
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