The Broken Bonds

Ch-7-Is he innocent?

Luckily the door was open and sonu entered seeing mahi standing and looking out of the window.

"What's so interesting out there?" Sonu asked as he went and stood beside mahi.
"Nothing" mahi answered after a moment.
"So let's go down and eat" sonu said.
"I don't want to, you go." Mahi answered.
"Mahi" sonu said "you know we believe in you right? No matter what anyone says, we are always with you, we will never leave you."
"Sonu." Mahi said now looking at sonu, tears threatening to fall down but mahi was trying to control it "was our friendship so weak that he didn't even try to listen to me. He didn't even give me a chance to speak. Was i so bad that my teammates who i considered my brothers didn't even think for one minute that maybe i am innocent? When did our bond go so weak, what did I do wrong?" Mahi asked the last bit now tears falling from his eyes.

Seeing him cry, sonu hugged him tightly. "You haven't done anything wrong, mahi. If you had, would we be with you? Would i, jaddu, rishu and Harry support you all this time? Would so many of your fans still support you? You had heard from Ashok right? That many of them still believe in you, would your friends Rohan and mohan believe in you? After so many people still trusting you, do you think you have done something wrong?"
"But then why didn't yuv....Yuvraj, and even virat or rohit or even da....dada didn't believe in me. Nor did Rahul bhai." Mahi said thinking about how no senior picked up his call. And totally ignored him. All these feelings, all these emotions he had managed to burry inside his heart in the three years. First six months sometimes he would not be able to sleep but he had won against his feelings in the end. But seeing yuvraj again and listening to all that he said, everything was just coming out again. The betrayal of them started to haunt him again.

Here sonu didn't know what to answer to mahi. He had called them specially Rahul bhai, but he just told that it was clear in the proofs. The recording had his voice. And he wasn't ready to listen to sonu.
"Mahi can i be honest? i don't know why they behaved like this or how could they believe some fake proofs over you, but what i do know is that we will never do it. Harry, jaddu, rishu and me and even Priyanka, she also believes in you immensely. We all are with you, we all know you have done nothing. Your friends will also be with you, they also know you have done nothing."

Mahi who was still hugging sonu, said "thank you sonu, i don't know what i did do deserve you."
"You have always supported me, wouldn't i do the same?" Sonu said and mahi smiled.
"Now let's go and eat." Sonu said and mahi nodded. He went to the washroom and washed his face so that everyone don't know that he was crying and then followed sonu to the dinning room.

Harry, jaddu, Rishabh and the children were having lunch talking to each other. The three elders smiled in relief as they saw mahi and sonu come together. Though Rishabh didn't know the details since harry and jaddu didn't get to tell him about it, he knew that it wouldn't have been good.

Sonu and mahi took their place and they started to eat. Harry and jaddu again and again glanced at mahi to check if he was alright. Mahi noticed this and gave them an assuring smile. But their worried glances made him realize that sonu was right. They still believed in him and loved him and that was more than enough for him.
He was so glad that he had brothers like them.

Here after coming to the hotel, yuvi was restless after seeing mahi. He had missed him terribly. But he was so hurt that mahi would do something like that, that he would betray them. But he couldn't stop wondering about the way sonu had looked when asking him to go and look at the proofs again. There was so much trust in his eyes, that yuvi would find that mahi was innocent. And so much trust in harry and jaddu's eyes for mahi and anger against yuvi. And finally mahi, why wasn't he saying something and why did he stop them from attacking him. And why did he look so hurt? If he was truly the culprit he wouldn't look so hurt. Mahi was never the one to show emotions, and it was hard to read him many times when they were playing together, but not this time. It was so easy for yuvi to read that mahi was hurt. The vulnerability was clearly there.

"I have to check it." Yuvi finally muttered to him self after these questions didn't stop circulating in his mind. He took out his phone and opened the recording that he hadn't in three years. He had saved it for what reason, he doesn't know, but never again opened it.
He played the recording and could hear mahi's voice saying "What do you have to offer me? Then there was a break.
"Only that much? For making the team loose a semi final? That's really less to be honest, i want more or the deal is cancelled." There was again a small break.
"One crore more than that." Mahi said again.
"Yeah, okay deal done." Mahi finally said "i should get half of the money tomorrow and the other half after the work is done." And with that the recording stopped.

"What was sonu even talking about? It's clearly mahi's voice." Yuvi thought.
But just then he remembered sonu's words "with open mind."

Yuvi didn't want to, but he gathered his strength and played the video again and again.
And after playing it for six times, he did realize something. There was a slight difference in the voice. The accent sounded different then when mahi normally spoke.
He listened to the voice four times more, very carefully.
And then he opened his YouTube and searched for mahi's speech and clicked on a random speech that came at the top. He heard it for sometime and then again played the recording.

"This is not mahi" yuvi finally realized as he sat down on the bed. "oh god what did we do?"
But then he remembered the photos of mahi going to meet someone and taking a bag. They had been given to an expert to check if it were photoshopped but he had said they weren't.
Yuvi called one of his friends from the bcci. "Hello yuvi what happened?" He asked.
"I need you to tell me something please. You know three years back in mumbai you on Dada's orders had decided to give some photos to check whether they were photoshopped or not, so who was that man?"

"You are asking about that Dhoni's photos which had to be given?" He asked
"Yeah" yuvi replied.
"But why what happened?"
"I just have some work, so can you please give me the address and the phone number."

Yuvi wrote down the address and the phone number in his phone, thanked him and cut the phone.
'If i call him, it won't be that effective' yuvi realized. 'I should better go to mumbai.'

He called his manager and asked him to book the first ticket to mumbai quickly and then started to pack his bags.

Yuvi didn't know what he wanted. He wanted sonu to be right and wrong both. Right because if mahi is innocent then that would be the best news for him in these three years and wrong because if mahi is innocent, yuvi had no idea how he was going to face him.