June 22, 2017 | Mumbai, India
The monsoon hadn't stopped in days. The city pulsed under grey skies and the rhythm of unrelenting rain. Inside a quiet apartment overlooking Bandra's restless skyline, Ishaan Verma sat at his writing desk — the lights dim, the curtains half-drawn.
On the desk: a cup of untouched black coffee, a stack of newspapers he hadn't dared to read, and an old leather-bound journal whose corners were frayed from years of turning, closing, and reopening.
He turned the cover.
The smell of ink, dust, and time hit him all at once.
There were pages filled with drawings from childhood — stick-figure batsmen, balls with motion lines, stadiums that looked more like castles.
Then came the letters.
Letters to Raghav.
🖋️ Dear Papa,
I saw your photo in the paper today. They used it during the broadcast after my hundred in Adelaide. You were smiling. The kind of smile that used to mean something.
But I don't know if you'd be smiling now.
He paused.
Rain slid down the windows like tears too tired to fall fast. His pen hovered over the paper.
Then:
🖋️ They cheered for me when I was standing. And they turned when I couldn't carry the team alone. You'd understand that, wouldn't you?
Because you told me once: "Cricket will give you the world… but take everything from you first."
You were right.
The Pen Stops
Ishaan's fingers trembled.
His vision blurred — not from sleep deprivation or the overhead light, but from the dam behind his eyes breaking at last.
He dropped the pen.
His head hit the desk softly. His shoulders shook in silence. Not a sob. Not a cry. Just breathless grief — the kind that can't be explained on talk shows or match panels.
For ten minutes, he didn't move.
The journal remained open, ink smudged where tears had fallen. One line half-written:
"All I wanted was to make you proud. But now…"
He couldn't finish it.
☁️ The Childhood Ground
By late afternoon, the skies had lightened just enough to make the world walkable.
Ishaan grabbed a hoodie and left the apartment without telling anyone — no PR agent, no security, no phone call to the BCCI.
He took a cab south. The driver didn't recognize him. Or if he did, he said nothing.
The cab stopped in front of a rusted iron gate, chained but not locked.
"You sure this is the place?" the driver asked.
Ishaan nodded.
"Always was."
He stepped through the gate into the forgotten world of his boyhood — Shivaji Maidan, tucked behind a row of tea stalls and mechanic shops.
The pitch was overgrown now. Grass uneven. Boundary rope frayed and missing. The pavilion walls bore graffiti now — not scores.
But Ishaan saw it differently.
To him, the ghost of a ten-year-old boy with too-large gloves still stood near the crease.
And beside him, a man with tired eyes and infinite patience.
🌀 Flashback: Raghav and the Bat
The sun had been high, the air sticky.
Ten-year-old Ishaan had cried after edging a tennis ball to his cousin during a family match.
Raghav had laughed.
"You can't cry every time you get out," he had said, kneeling beside him. "You'd flood the field by lunch."
"But I was trying to hit a six!"
"Exactly. That's the problem. You tried to hit. You didn't feel it."
Raghav had taken his small hands and adjusted the grip.
"It's not about hitting, Ishi. It's about timing. Let the bat speak, not your ego."
They'd practiced for hours that day. Not to win. But to understand.
That evening, Ishaan had written his first letter to his father. He had left it under Raghav's pillow:
"Today I hit three cover drives. You smiled. I think I want to keep making you smile."
🏏 Back in the Present
Ishaan sat at the same spot near the boundary rope now.
The grass stained his jeans. The air smelled of wet earth and rusted dreams.
He pulled his hoodie tighter and picked up a fallen branch. Practiced a drive. Then another.
There were no cameras. No claps. No Harsha Bhogle praising his technique. No angry fans trending hashtags.
Just him. And echoes.
A drizzle began again. Soft, patient.
He didn't run.
He let it wash over him.
📓 Return to the Journal
That night, back in his apartment, Ishaan opened the journal again.
No tears this time.
Just words.
🖋️ Dear Papa,
I went back to Shivaji Maidan today. It still remembers us. I practiced under the trees again. No crowd. No critics. Just that broken stump you nailed into the mud with your old hammer.
You always said cricket would give me the world.
It did.
It gave me lights. Applause. Fame. Pressure. Pain. Pride.
But today, it gave me silence. Not empty silence. But the kind where I could hear your voice again.
And I realised something — maybe it isn't the world I wanted. Maybe I just wanted you to see it with me.
Maybe I just wanted you to say: "You're doing okay, Ishaan."
Because right now, I don't know if I am.
🎵 Music in the Dark
Later that night, Ishaan sat on his floor with a cassette player he hadn't touched in years.
He inserted a tape labeled: "Nets with Papa — Dec 2006."
Static.
Then a faint voice.
"Again. Watch the ball. Play late."
"But it's slow, Papa!"
"Still. Let it come to you. Cricket isn't a fight. It's a dance."
He closed his eyes.
Listened.
🎯 Final Lines
The chapter ends with Ishaan walking to his balcony.
The rain had stopped.
The bat from the final still sat near the railing. He picked it up. Taped it again. Tightened the grip. This time, not like a monument to failure.
But a promise to rebuild.
His journal remained open on the desk. The last line underlined.
"You always said cricket would give me the world."
"It gave me silence instead."