"Here's to you...." "....on your success...." ".........and to your future...." Offering their toast in a chorus of congratulatory wishes, everyone present drank to the man of the hour, who in turn considered it ironic, for he had neither. He downed the glass of amber liquid, feeling it burn its way down his throat, knowing it would take a lot more of it to erase his torment but that was one path he had resolved never to take no matter how bitter the going got. She was his for all eternity, he vowed determinedly.