They ordered Chinese. 

     By the time they got a look at the restaurant's website they were hungry, so everything looked good. They ended up ordering seven different entrees, along with soup and rice and fortune cookies. 

     They also ordered a magnum of champagne from another place.

     The champagne got there first.

     "You want to pop it now or wait until the food gets here?" Brock asked. 

     "Now. It'll give us an appetite." 

     "Like I'm not starving right now." 

     Estelle got another look at the stairway as she popped the cork.

​     "Sorry you missed this, you two," she said to her absent friends. "Don't be gone long, please."

     They filled their champagne glasses. 

     They toasted. 

     "To the future," Estelle said.

     "Fair enough." They drank to that. Then, "What do you think happened to Noel?"

     "I wish I knew. I hope we get to ask before we have to...have to..."

     "What do you think happened to ​Shawnacy?"

     "I don't even want to think about that." Estelle shuddered.

​     The front door rang.  

     Dinner had arrived.

     Brock carried four bags of the hot, delicious smelling food into the kitchen on his lap. Estelle carried the other three bags. She pulled clean plates out of the dishwasher rather than the cupboard because, to get to the cupboard, Estelle would have to use her stool, and she wasn't in the mood for that.

     "Let's go up on the balcony," Estelle said. 

     "It's kind of raining out there, Estelle."

​     "It's our last night. Come on."

     The view from the balcony was one of the surrounding apartment buildings and not much else.

     "I took off a few times from here," Brock said. "Totally against the rules, of course. If anybody'd seen me, I...anyway. It was our first year here. I'd see something in the distance, and I'd want to go check it out." 

     "I spent most of our first year in the training room." 

     "I remember." 

     "I didn't get any of you at all."

​     "Boy, do I get that."

     "You want to get drunk?" Estelle asked. 

​     "Yes. I mean yes and no. We are moving tomorrow, remember. It'd be nice if we didn't have to do it with hangovers. On the other hand..."

     'Yes?" 

     "It's our last night here together. When I thought about this night before we began our mission, I...you know, I thought we'd have a light meal and a ​little something to drink." 

​     "There you go. That's exactly where I was at, too."

     "But now...after what we went through today...there's a part of me that wants a ​bunch of drinks, but I'm not sure how great an idea that really is." 

     "Come on. We'll go drink for drink. What do you say?" 

     "Let me finish my plate, first." 

     "I'll meet you downstairs."

                                              CONTINUE

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