An Uchiha At Heart || SasuSaku

20. Wedding

It was no secret that words weren't Sasuke's forte, which is why Kakashi had thought ahead and helped Sasuke articulate something simple, genuine, and heartfelt for this very crucial moment.

The Uchiha looked at the priest, then to his beautiful bride. She smiled softly at him, and so he held her half-invisible gaze and spoke with much more ease than he anticipated: "I, Uchiha Sasuke, promise to take Haruno Sakura as my wife, and to love and cherish her to the best of my ability until the end of times."

There was a short silence. Sakura's heart palpitations got louder and louder, the world seemed to comprise of nothing but her and her husband; the man looking straight at her, the man that just verbally vowed to love her. Even the family members gathered around them could feel it—this moment right here, this was Sakura and Sasuke's world, and everyone else was just living in it.

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The rest of the ceremony flew by quickly. The newly wed couple offered a branch of sakiki (a sacred tree) to the shrine, the two families exchanged a cup of sake to celebrate the new family bond, and then everyone was quickly off to the reception, after Naruto had made a short hassle of taking group pictures in front of the shrine.

The venue Ino and Sai had chosen was beautiful. It was in one of the more intimate spots of the Konoha Gardens, with ornaments and lanterns literally tied to the trees, illuminating the round tables with red and black table cloths, complimented by small vases of sakuras and roses in the center of each seating arrangement.

"Saaaaakuuuuuraaaa!" Ino yelled as soon as she saw her friend arrive. She ran to her best friend and gave her a hug so tight it made her headache throb a little more. Before Sakura could say anything, Ino finally let go. She pulled Sakura's wataboshi upwards a little, held her shoulders, and just looked at her. "Stunning. All my hard work in choosing your outfit paid off."

"You just want to take credit for everything, don't you?" Sakura whined jokingly.

"Obviously," Ino laughed. "And—oh yeah, Sasuke-kun!" the blonde had finally realized that there was another person standing by Sakura. "Congratulations."

"Thank you," the groom replied, looking between her and Sakura. All the socialization was making him feel uncomfortable, so he just took to looking at his wife every time he was unsure what to do or where to direct his attention.

"You need to change into your irouchikake," Ino reminded Sakura. "But we need to take pictures with you first."

Ino called over the rest of the girls, then Naruto quickly came over and demanded that he wanted more pictures again with his old teammates.

Throughout the repetitive process, Sakura made sure to hold Sasuke's hand and squeeze it a little tighter every time. It was a reassuring gesture; it even made Sasuke smile in most of the photos. He was recognizing already how much Sakura's close presence was affecting him even more than it had in the past few months when they'd traveled together. It was making him feel some type of way he couldn't quite explain, until Sakura left to change into her second outfit for the night—He could immediately feel her absence and was starting to get socially anxious again, but more than that, he wanted Sakura, he wanted to be with her, he wanted to be alone with her.

He couldn't wait for the night to be over, so he headed over towards the food area find some damn water.

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Sakura came back wearing a beautiful pink irouchikake with a maroon floral print. She had a pinkish purple flower holding her short hair away from her eyes, and she held a green fan that matched the color of her eyes.