When Jassi broke up with his long time girlfriend Divya, a month after his Test debut, he pined for another whole month.

Everything set him off bawling, old photos, old chats, existing tshirts, filter coffee, his car, the sun, the moon, the stars.

Especially at night.

After a day at practice, or playing, at night, when he tried to sleep was when the memories would plague him worst. Which meant he'd spent pretty much the whole month on minimal sleep, which was not good for a fast bowler's health.

His team was at their wits' end.

"Will you let a girl ruin your career, Jassi?" Virat had appealed the first week.

"You're one to talk," said Rohit.

"Mine was about Anushka. This Divya was clearly not meant for Jassi!"

Jassi's red eyes bored into his.

"Not helping, Virat," Bhuvi murmured.

And that was the thing. Nothing did help.

Till Hardik joined the squad for the limited overs series.

****************

The first time Hardik tried to imply it was time to move on from Divya, Jassi yelled the roof down.

"YOU KEEP YOUR STUPID ADVICE TO YOURSELF, HARDIK, NO ONE'S COMPETING WITH YOU REGARDING HOW MANY PEOPLE YOU CAN DATE IN ONE MONTH."

After he stormed off, Hardik gaped after him.

"You don't try to suggest the moving on option, Hardik," said Shikhar sympathetically.

"Why not?" asked Hardik, astonished.

"Because--" Several of his teammates waved at the doorway Jassi had disappeared through, indicating this had happened before and would happen again.

"Oh," said Hardik, much put out. "Maybe he'd appreciate a plan of taking revenge on Divya?"

"No!" said Rohit and Bhuvi in unison.

"He's a peace loving person," added Virat.

"Well, I'm not going to give him advice about winning Divya back," said Hardik. "Never liked her much. Too controlling."

"I suppose you can only be glad," said Rahul stoically, "that he didn't overhear."

**************

So Jassi ended up ignoring Hardik his first evening back, but that night, he snuck into Hardik's room and woke him up with a hug as an expression of remorse.

Very late at night, to be fair.

"Haven't you been sleeping?" asked Hardik, yawning.

"No."

"Straightforward," said Hardik. "Why haven't you?"

Jassi pushed Hardik to make space for himself and got into the bed.

"I dunno. I try to sleep, and then I end up thinking of Divya the whole night."

"It's been a month," said Hardik cautiously.

Jassi sighed.

"I know you don't want to hear it," went on Hardik, even more cautiously. "But you really need to, um--"

"Move on?"

"Yes!" said Hardik, relieved that the m-word wasn't taboo anymore.

"If it had been that easy, I wouldn't be here today, would I?"

"No," admitted Hardik. "You need something to distract you. Get you move on."

Honestly, Jassi had never much liked Hardik's suggestions--

"You know what I'd suggest?" asked Hardik brightly.

"Not interested," said Jassi.

Hardik sniffed haughtily.

"What would you suggest?" asked Jassi grudgingly.

"You try asking out that TV presenter you detest..."

"Asking out, as in?"

"How many ways of asking out do you know of, Jass?" asked Hardik.

"Why would I ask out someone I detest and who detests me?"

"You sure she detests you? It's pretty difficult to detest you," said Hardik thoughtfully. "What's her name again? Sanjana?"

"Yeah."

"Nice name. Goes with yours. Green flag. Jassi-Sanjana. Jassanjana. Sanjana-Jassi. Sanjassi."

"Hardik?"

"Hm?" asked Hardik, still lost in his phonetics.

"Will you shut the hell up and lemme sleep?"

Hardik straightened up, indignant. "I was sleepy and you were the one who didn't let me sleep saying you can't sleep."

"Well, now I can." Jassi covered his head with the pillow. "Your awful advice acts as lullaby, apparently."

Hardik pulled off the pillow and shone his phone's flashlight directly into Jassi's eyes.

"What's wrong with--"

"Don't you see how your names show you're meant to be together?" demanded Hardik. "Gimme your phone, I'd send Sanjana a text."

"Obviously I don't have her number."

"Obviously I didn't mean WhatsApp, dummy. Obviously people don't have the range of only asking out girls whose contacts they have saved. How d'you think I ask people out?"

"How?"

Hardik heaved a sigh of years-long suffering. "There's something called Instagram, Jassi. That's why Instagram was created originally, you know."

"No, it was not," said Jassi, horrified that the world should build an app so people could ask people out.

"Hope it's nice and cozy under your stone."

"It is, thanks."

"Clearly it's not!" said Hardik. "You're crying over a girl over a month!"

"She was my girlfriend over a year!"

"See?" said Hardik. "Not that cozy a stone, is it?"

Jassi wanted to tear his hair out.

"That's why I'm saying ask Sanjana out," coaxed Hardik.

"No," said Jassi, covering his head with the pillow again. "Not happening in a million years."

Hardik was quiet for a suspiciously long time.

"Getting sleepy, too, are you?" Jassi remarked.

No answer. Not even a wisecrack. Not even a good night.

"Hardik?"

Jassi was forced to remove the damned pillow again. Hardik was sitting cross-legged, typing into his phone.

Wait, wait.

It was not his phone. It was Jassi's phone.

"What are you--" Jassi sat up with the earliest stirring of panic. "Harry, what are you doing?"

"Done," said Hardik smugly.

Fearing the worst, Jassi snatched his phone back. It was open into the DM screen of Instagram.

Sanjana Ganesan.

Jassi had barely gone past, 'Hi, Sanjana! Heard you're in--' when Hardik grabbed the phone back and pressed on delete.

Which was fine with Jassi, because of course he'd meant to delete the message as soon as he'd read it.

Except--

Hardik pressed not on Delete for everyone but on Delete for me.

"Hardik, are you insane?"

Hardik looked very smug indeed. "Now you can't undo it."

"I get that, funnily enough," snarled Jassi.

"You're a smart kid," said Hardik lazily, returning Jassi's useless phone to him and lying down on his back.

"Why would you do something like this?"

"Hey, she's pretty," protested Hardik. "I didn't try to set you up with some--"

"You dare finish that sentence!"

"Sorry," said Hardik quickly. "She's cool, too. I'm sure I've heard Kuliya say she's cool, even if she did make 'em learn those Bengali poems."

"Kuldeep thinks Jacqueline Fernandez is cool!"

"Well, she is--"

"You're impossible." Jassi flung the pillow at Hardik's head, hard, and repeated it a few more times for good measure. "I can't imagine how anyone can be so interfering."

"Maybe it's time to stretch the limits of your imagination," said Hardik with a wink.

To which Jassi could only repeat, in the most disgusted tone he could manage, "You're impossible."

"Yep, I take pride in that."

"Someday I'll take pride in killing India's best all rounder by hanging him in a public square."

"Nice," said Hardik approvingly. "A few more of those pick up lines and you're set."

"It wasn't a--it wasn't--"

Why do I even try? wondered Jassi.

"Anyway," he said grimly. "I don't suppose Sanjana's going to reply, but if she does, I'll ignore her, and your evil plot to mess up my life will fail anyway, Hardik."

"If you ignore a girl after asking her out, you can never lecture me about mistreating a girl ever again, Jassi." Hardik beamed like he'd had a victory.

"I don't mistreat-- you sent the text!"

"For all she knows, you did." Hardik's beam widened. "To preserve yourself, you absolutely have to reply."

He did sound like he'd won something big.

Jassi did the only thing he deemed dignified enough. He covered his head with the pillow a final time and tried to go to sleep.

He hadn't realized how tired he'd been after a month of pining. Now that his brain was too chock-full of Hardik's nonsense to think of his broken heart, he felt he could sleep a week straight.

"G'night, then," said Hardik, and just as Jassi was drifting off, Hardik ruffled his hair in what Jassi was sure was a patronizing manner.

If he'd been less tired, he would've slapped the hand away.

As things were, he had no choice but to let Hardik pat his head patronizingly into sleep.