MARCH (RAVI'S INTERLUDE)

Contrary to Hana's accusation, Ravi Misra doesn't have crushes, he has muses. Sora is his new muse. Companion to the March chapter of Vows.

This is the longest day and it's only ten-thirty.

Ravi was in an unusual mood in March. He'd been charged with designing a Cannes trousseau for the daughter of a studio executive. Her demands played to his strengths, power and delicacy poured into a single silhouette. Should be easy. Ravi breathed classic lines in taupe silk and mauve satin. He designed sweetheart necklines in his sleep. This, he could do. With Diana Parrilla tasked with equipping each design with the requisite baubles and jewel-encrusted charms, this young woman was determined to shine. And so shine she shall.

It wasn't the drive to design that eluded Ravi this month, but the inspiration. He had met his client on three separate occasions; first, to make the arrangements and twice more for progress fittings. The outcome of each visit shifted by inches, unseated by her stringent pre-film festival dieting regimen. Ravi was something of a tailor by training, alterations were a fact of the trade that he wasn't prone to letting faze him. That said, the more he altered these gowns to suit the changing frame of his client, the less he believed they were meant for the woman who wore them. Something was wrong and it had been from the start.

This concern had woken him twice in the night and sent him sketching for hours in search of this woman instead of the woman who had taken up residence in back of his mind since New Year's Eve. He had begun to flounder at what he did best because he was finding it impossible to be inspired by anybody else.

Sora Gallegos, what are you doing to me?

Ravi considered the drop waist on the teal and brass number he'd been tinkering with for the last twenty minutes. Not quite Sora. He had a mental list of styles that wouldn't suit her that he'd composed between the odd lunch meeting and coffee date. He was a designer, he had such a list for any woman he'd met more than twice. This was a gown that Imogen or Yelena might dazzle in, or Ravi's young charge might. He marked it and set it aside to show his client at the day's fitting.

He reviewed the dresses already in their final stages for imperfections. The first was a blue racerback dress that boasted a plunging neckline, braided straps, and a full-length flared skirt.

The second was a modified Greco-Roman-style toga in ivory. Marchesa had made hay of the classic trend in bridal wear a few years back, but Ravi had plans to bring it back to evening. It doesn't feel right. He wasn't sure what it would take to change that.

There was a knock at his door and then Auntie Nyna appeared. "I've got Hana for you."

Ravi frowned and gestured for his aunt to send her in. This was proving to be a trying month for what was left of their relationship. He wasn't blind to her attempts to recruit their friends and family into her campaign to rekindle their romance, and in another situation, he'd be flattered to have a woman vie for his attention this tenaciously. He couldn't deny how good it felt to be wanted by her when their history was speckled with such denials. It was the casualties of Hana's campaigns for his heart that failed to impress him anymore.

Hana swept into his office carrying bags of takeout from their favorite South Asian restaurant. The only one for miles that tasted like what his mother and auntie Nyna used to make.

Ravi rose to meet her. "Hey, what's this about?"

"It's about us."

Ravi shifted his weight and shut his sketchpad. "What about us?"

"We've waited months for this to feel right. Don't you think it's time we start making it right?"

"I don't think that's down to me."

She had the good grace to look abashed.

"No, of course not. It's down to me. I've been brooding on your disappointment in me when I should have been showing you that I've changed. I know what I need to do now."

Hana set about laying out place settings for each of them—food boxes, hard plastic utensils, and plastic champagne flutes. Ravi rubbed his face. Yeah, all right, he was a little charmed.

"What do you think you need to do?"

"Try."

She brought out a bottle wrapped in foil and, unwrapping it enough to uncover the top, popped the cork to let the bubbling nectar flow into their glasses. Ravi fought his inner critic and took the flute she offered him.

"What's the occasion?"

"You've been working hard."

"The day isn't over yet." Noon was still an hour out.

"I think you should take a break and join me for lunch. Reward yourself for keeping your nose to grindstone."

Doubt Narsi would agree, Ravi thought dourly in the confines of his mind.

"So what'd you bring?"

"Are you considering joining me?"

Ravi had had a late breakfast, he wasn't famished, but the thought it was only fair he let Hana try talking him around. Isn't that what I keep saying I want? That wasn't precisely it. I keep saying I want time. He needed to manage his expectations better.

"I'll consider it if you make it worth my while." He gestured toward the takeout boxes.

"I know you so well." She popped the removable tops for each dish. "Karahi lamb for me and chicken jhalfrazi for you." She still knew what he liked.

"You didn't have to go to all this trouble, we could have gone out for lunch." They always went to that little Filipino place they'd gotten engaged at in their twenties, before everything went wrong. He'd order the chicken inasal and she the kare kare. They'd stagger home, full and laughing. What a love story theirs used to be.

Used to be.

"It's effort. I'm making an effort to prove I'm serious about us getting back to where we need to be."

Ravi took a napkin to cover his lap. "You've been straightforward with me, even if I don't understand why you did what you did, I really appreciate that."

"It was better if you heard the truth from me. I wanted you to trust me, that's still what I want for that to happen, honesty has to be my personal policy."

"You really have changed, haven't you?"

Hana beamed and he swore she lit up the room.

"I have. I'll prove it to you, I'll prove it to everyone, including Sora. You'll see."

Ravi felt a little of the tension in his shoulders ease.

"Give Sora time, she'll come around. She just needs to heal, y'know? These last couple of years haven't been the easiest for her."

He took a bite of his chicken, eating slower to let the taste of ground cumin and fresh coriander unfurl on his tongue. He smiled. Tarka never fails.

Hana smiled her self-satisfied little smile that meant she knew she'd scored a point with him. He rolled his eyes in fondness.

"You don't need to worry about Sora. Look around you, she's come out ahead in all this. She got the CEO chair. She has full custody of Tommy. She even has you on her side. What more could she need?"

Ravi put off his next forkful. "I can't answer that. Which doesn't mean I wouldn't give it to her if I could."

"She doesn't need you to be her white knight and she wouldn't be happy to hear you think of her as a damsel in distress." Hana sipped her champagne, crinkling her nose against the bubbles.

"I don't think of her as any such thing. She's my friend and that makes her problems my problems."

"Including me?"

She's been waiting for that one.

"You're your own separate issue for both of us. I can't induce her to let you back into her confidence any more than she could do that for me. We're independent people capable of thinking for ourselves."

"The two of you have been inseparable since you came back. People are starting to talk."

"That's what people do to keep life interesting. They talk." Ravi took a drink.

Hana sat forward as thought about to impart some supreme confidence and he instinctively leaned into listen.

"Reconciliation between Sora and Anthony will be difficult if he has reason to think the two of you are an item."

Ravi couldn't keep his disgust from showing. He put down his glass in revulsion. "I don't care about Anthony Himura's feelings enough to let them change my behavior. Besides, those two are over. He's more interested in a future with you." He had ears and eyes all over L.A. He had Sora who told him just about everything and vice versa.

"Would you stake Sora's lifelong happiness on that?"

"Would you?"

Hana speared a dried aricot on her fork.

"I wasn't aware you held Sora in such high esteem."

Ravi permitted her obvious deflection.

"Why wouldn't I? She's an extraordinary woman."

"If I didn't know better, I'd say you had a crush. I don't think we've had one discussion in months that where you didn't mention her."

"She's an important part of my life."

"She'd be delighted to hear you say that," Hana gushed. "She's never made friends easily."

"Some people mistake introversion fora lack of anything to say. Sora's got opinions coming out of her ears."

"I'd know all about that. Since she was girl, she'd be quiet as a mouse until you got her going, then look out."

"I like that about her, it means she chooses her words carefully. Speaking rarely means that those occasions when she does speak out are all the more worth hearing."

"Aiko was right, that is some crush you've got there."

Ravi shook his head. "This isn't high school. I can express admiration for somebody without it meaning anything."

"Sora might not agree."

"Sora is as smart as they come. She knows how I feel about her."

"How do you feel about my sister, Ravi?"

"I already told you—"

"You told me you admire her, but I've seen you show admiration and I've seen you infatuated. You need to be careful. My sister's been hurt enough."

Ravi pushed his plate away from him. "Okay, you need to understand something. I have no intention of hurting her. I love her, I care about her; I wouldn't do that."

Hana's chewing slowed, slowing, slowing and then stopping altogether.

"You love her."

Ravi was up to his neck in a hole he'd been digging since New Year's, and he hadn't even realized he was holding the spade. Where did that come from?

"We've been family for years, of course I love her."

Hana appeared to accept his reasoning, scooping up rice in her spoon instead of poking a bevy of holes in his poor rationale.

"You need to be prepared for her not to return your feelings. She's still wrapped up in Anthony."

"You misunderstood me, Sora and I don't have that kind of relationship. We're friends."

"You have a way of transforming friendships into love affairs with very little warning."

"You know me well."

"I know you very well. So does Sora."

"This conversation has taken a weird turn. What are you saying exactly?"

"Our interludes with other people always end the same way. Maybe it's time we skipped the histrionics and got back together."

"I have to give it you, that was a subtle workaround. But I'm not there yet. I love you, but I'm not there."

"What will it take?"

"I couldn't tell you. I only know that us getting back together doesn't feel like the thing to do right now."

When a knock sounded at his door, Ravi thanked his visitor for their unparalleled timing.

I can't do another argument. Every part of this conversation was out of left field.