Summary: Sasuke confesses his undying love for a certain yellow-haired dobe, and when Naruto (who believes himself to be perfectly straight btw) hesitates, Sasuke completely misunderstands and agrees to marry Sakura! Will Naruto make it in time to crash the wedding?

Warning: A bit of OOC Sasuke. =]

=A Day to be Celebrated=

It was a day to be celebrated - or at least, it was to all except for the birthday boy. Really, birthday at a bar? He was underage and everything! What kind of Uchiha could have a good time in a nightclub, surrounded by idiots giving him praise? He didn't want attention, he wouldn't touch the alcohol, and he found the provocatively dancing girls up on stage less than appealing. They'd never convince him to give them a second look, not for all the winks and suggestive smiles in the world. It wasn't like Sasuke hadn't been hit on enough in his lifetime anyway.

Yes, Sasuke Uchiha was eighteen years of age today - and despite his assurances that the date of his birth would most definitely not be let known to the public, it was to his absolute misfortune that teachers (including Kakashi-sensei) were alerted by the principal whenever one of the students became of age. Not to mention, Tsunade must have known how much Sasuke would despise being thrown a party.

When he'd found out about the whole ordeal, he'd stormed his way right up into her office, but she'd just smirked and told him he needed to lighten up. Was a principal really authorized to allow her students to go on an outing which would inevitably lead to much drinking and the creation of fake IDs? Sasuke didn't think so, but then again, Tsunade had never been your average high school principal.

He wouldn't have come to this place willingly. He really wouldn't have. If not for the full-out Uzumaki pout he'd gotten from Naruto. Sasuke absolutely refused to admit that that look had any kind of power over him whatsoever - it was just, the thought of being near an intoxicated Naruto sounded like something he should take an interest in.

And intoxicated Naruto was, and so far, the night was going completely awry from the way Sasuke'd imagined it. He'd kind of somewhat hoped that the dobe would finally take a hint, notice Sasuke and sweep him up into his arms, confess his everlasting love and the two of them would end up in one or the other's bedroom by the end of the night. Or perhaps just in some obscure out-of-the-way coat closet somewhere. Where it happened didn't really matter, but Sasuke found himself getting impatient.

Whereas the Uchiha himself couldn't stand to look up at the scantly dressed, big breasted women up on the bar, Naruto was practically sitting in one of their laps. Sasuke kept his arms crossed, face flaming from anger and disappointment, and tried hard not to sulk.

He was distracted when suddenly a cup of sake was pushed in front of him. He looked up, half expecting to see one of the half-naked women trying to coax him into the drink. Instead, he found sitting there his longtime friend and consultant-- Sakura. Their odd and unexpected friendship had started up in middle school, when he'd still been friendless, and hopelessly in love with a certain Uzumaki. Sakura, at the time, had been head honcho of the Sasuke Uchiha fan club - of which Sasuke himself had still been blissfully unaware, not that that had lasted long.

Back then, no one had known the real reason why Sasuke was so quiet. Everyone who knew him, or knew of him, had misunderstood, which had been a good thing for Sasuke. It wasn't that Sasuke was as tough and as cold as he pretended to be - he was just good at acting the part. All the undeserved, unwanted attention he'd received from teacher and schoolmates alike had only made things worse for him. He'd always been a quiet kid in school, and had tried to make it as apparent as possible that the reason behind it being was that everyone annoyed him.

Actually, it was much the opposite. After the death of his family (at the hands of his older brother, Itachi) Sasuke had realized his complete and utter worthlessness. Rather than willing himself to become stronger, he'd sank into a state of depression and had rather abruptly lost all forms of self-confidence he'd ever had.

It wasn't until the student body was placed into "Teams" (groups of three who were meant to be study partners... or something) that anybody really realized Sasuke's true character. It had been unfortunate, but that's a story for another time.

So, back to his middle school years -- Sasuke, a loner, and Sakura, the leader of the Evil!Fangirl Pack. Here's a basic account of how it went down:

flashback, babeh--

Sasuke, sitting on his own again, looking forlorn. Anyone who looked his way was sent a double dose of the usual icy stare. He was in a particularly foul brooding sort of mood, and wasn't one to be trifled with. He barely had to act - the little bit of anger in him was beginning to surface for real for once. He'd woken up late that morning, had been unable to shower, and therefore on this day, his hair was a useless mess on top of his head, and bad hair days were always the worst.

He was intently but secretively watching Naruto when Sakura approached him. The pink haired girl sat down and asked him the million dollar question, the thing that everyone else had always been too afraid to come up and say to him -- "Why are you always sitting by yourself?"

/ flashback

And that's how it started. Sasuke'd wasted a bit of effort fruitlessly trying to get Sakura to leave him alone after that, but had been unsuccessful. After just that one moment, Sakura had refused to leave his side. She'd sit with him in class, and smile at him, and talk with him as if he were any ordinary friend. She'd ignored all his long silences, the fact that he was quiet and never responded to any of her efforts to get him to open up. Then finally one day, he'd asked why she even bothered with him, and she'd admitted that it was because he seemed lonely.

Now Sakura was one of Sasuke's only friends - aside from Naruto, and it was only thanks to her that the blonde boy even knew he existed in the first place. Once alerted to the fact that Sasuke was a straight-A student, and that everyone looked up to him for apparently no reason, the blonde boy had vowed to make Sasuke his rival, which had gone perfectly awry from how Sasuke had imagined their fateful first encounter.

Yes, it was sadly true. Despite what most people believed, Sasuke was just a timid, apprehensive, angst-filled guy - completely unable to stand up for himself, helpless in the throes of young boy love, and positively, totally, undeniably pathetic. As many times as Sakura had prodded him to admit his love to Naruto, Sasuke was unable, and useless.

He had managed to do one thing right, however. Naruto had continued to peruse Sasuke as a "rival" through out their first two years of high school, even long after they'd been teamed up together. However, eventually somehow the two of them had ended up becoming friends. It'd taken them a while, since Naruto was dense and oblivious as to the way that Sasuke felt about him - the blonde had completely misunderstood, taking Sasuke's embarrassed anger for actual real anger. After a while though, he'd finally noticed that Sasuke wasn't really the badass everyone thought him to be. He'd noticed Sasuke's timidity, finally realizing the reason behind all the Uchiha glares and steely silences was just that the raven was shy.

And from that day on, Naruto had used that knowledge to his advantage. Sasuke almost wished that the dobe had stayed ignorant of it - it'd been better when Naruto had hated him, not to mention much less nerve-wracking.

"How are you holding up?" Sakura asked, with slight worry shining in her eyes. She knew better than to show actual emotion toward Sasuke in public by now. Despite the fact that his two teammates were now aware of his more reserved nature, Sasuke was still keeping up appearances for the rest of the world. Most of them had no idea that he was really just a useless wreck, and he liked it that way.

Sasuke sighed heavily, eyeing the drink for a minute, and actually considered picking it up and drinking it. "Fine," he replied shortly, opting to ignore the offensive bit of alcohol, and pursed his lips, rubbing at his forehead.

Noticing the signs of an oncoming headache, Sakura pulled out a Tylenol from her purse and handed it over to him, ordering a glass of water to help him swallow it down. Oh yes, about Sakura -- she was still ultimate leader of the Sasuke fan club, and deserving of it to, since she was the only one out of all the fangirls who could actually get close to him. However she was more manipulative than anyone could have imagined.

Her staying on as the leader of the pack was quite advantageous for Sasuke - she was suitably able to keep most of the adoring fan club off his back most of the time. In fact, she'd managed to convince the , eager group that his birthday party was being held in some far-off land, because the Uchiha clan had long ago befriended a neighboring country's prince. It was laughable, some of the stuff those girls would actually believe. They thought that Sasuke was great - some sort of inhumanly perfect entity - and so Sakura and Sasuke would play their parts, and convince them that what they believed was true.

"Maybe the best place for your party wasn't a bar...."

"Tch. You were in on it too, traitor," Sasuke mumbled, putting his head down. He glanced over once to notice that Naruto still wasn't paying attention. In fact, the blonde boy was absolutely engrossed with the woman he was currently sucking face with.

"It's your birthday, Sasuke," Sakura said with an apologetic smile. "I guess I was just hoping that one of these days you'd gain the ability to be a little more social."

"Yeah well, don't get your hopes up." Sasuke stared down at the floor beneath his feet, his heart sinking quickly. This day couldn't have gone any worse.

Scratch that. It obviously could.

Sasuke would have been perfectly content to sit at that one spot at the bar with his head down all night, but Naruto's object of infatuation had decided to play hard to get, and had left him for a moment. Of course, whenever Naruto was bored or didn't know what to do with himself, he did what he always did best - bug the living hell out of Sasuke. It was a favorite pastime for the dobe, and one of the stronger more annoying inconveniences for Sasuke, seeing as he was helpless against his foxy friend, and could do nothing about it.

"C'mon, Sasuke," Naruto complained, sneaking up behind him suddenly. Sasuke jumped at the feel of Naruto's hands on his hips, pinching him lightly. "Liven up, have some fun."

Sasuke turned to frown at him. "Get off me, you drunken idiot," he growled quietly.

Naruto laughed, and leaned heavily against Sasuke's back, resting his chin on the Uchiha's shoulder. It was a little embarrassing, but Sasuke wasn't about to complain. "I'm not drunk," Naruto said, and was contradicted by the heavy smell of alcohol on his breath. Suddenly the blonde guy seemed to notice the sake cup that Sasuke hadn't touched. "You could stand to get a little intoxicated yourself, y'know."

Sasuke scoffed. "No way," he declined. God knows what he'd do in a state like that. Sasuke wasn't about to get inebriated with Naruto around.

"Feh, suit yourself." Naruto had spotted his babe again, and was off to round her up. Sasuke's back was suddenly cold without the weight of the dobe pressed against him, and he blushed, banging his forehead on the bar once. He was so stupid. And Naruto was so stupid. And bars were stupid, and birthday parties were definitely stupid. Sasuke wished that he was the kind of person everyone thought he was. If so, he might go ask that chick her name, and pen it down so that he might look her up, find out where she lived, and go all scary-murderous-Uchiha on her.

If only jealousy made him stronger rather than making him feel even more powerless. Why the hell did Naruto have to toy with him like that anyway? If the guy was just gonna go running off with some chick again... he shouldn't have even bothered to stop and talk to Sasuke at all in the first place.

Somehow Sasuke had managed to convince himself that he was completely insignificant, because even at the party that was supposed to be for him he seemed to go completely ignored again. Needless to say, he was really regretting not allowing himself to drink, before shutting his eyes and falling into an uncomfortable sleep.

Sasuke Uchiha must have been the only person in the entire world who was able to sleep at a noisy bar without being the slightest bit intoxicated. The ruckus and the music and even the occasional fight that broke out hadn't been enough to stir him at all, and it was in the early hours of the morning the next day when Sakura finally shook him awake. It was still dark outside, but wouldn't be for much longer, and Sasuke's pink haired friend was stumbling all over herself blind drunk. "Feh. You too?" he asked indifferently, turning to her.

She hiccupped once, tripped over her own feet, and landed in his lap, clinging to his shoulders and wrapping her arms around his neck. Immediately Sasuke blushed a bright violent red. "Oh, Sasuke-kun," Sakura purred in his ear, and Sasuke was at a total loss of what to do. It wasn't often that Sakura slipped into her old habits of hitting on him, but it did happen from time to time. It was just that, in all the times before, she had never been quite this drunk.

Sakura's hands caressed his shoulders in an embarrassing way, her fingers creeping up to play with and tug at his hair, while the other hand made its way dangerously low. Sasuke chocked out a short cry, feebly trying to push her off. He'd never been hit on to quite this extreme extent before, either.

Ironically enough, his savior of the day would be Naruto. One second Sakura was fumbling at Sasuke's waist, drunkenly trying to find his penis so that she might fondle him, and the next Naruto was behind her, pulling her hands away from him. The dobe straightened her out with a frown, and told her quite curtly that "that probably wasn't the best thing to do for the time being, even if Sasuke was desperately in need of some sexual exultation."

"B-but Sasu-chan...." green eyes gazed stupidly off to Sasuke's left - obviously, she thought that she was looking right at him.

Naruto snorted with laughter, trying to hold it in. "Now, now, we don't want to scar poor Sasu-chan, do we? I don't think he'd particularly enjoy being felt-up by one of his friends." Sakura looked back up at Naruto, obviously unaware of the fact that her balance was slowly slipping and that she was leaning heavily against him. After a minute, his words seemed to reach her, and she numbly nodded her head. "Uh-huh," she agreed, and swayed on her feet.

"Right," Naruto said, still smirking. "Which is why you need to go home."

"Oh.... Alright." Sakura was drunk, but not stupid. The bar was nearly empty, and for just one second, her eyes were knowing as they met with Sasuke's. If she went home now, he and Naruto would be two of the only people left in the place. And apparently she was trying to tell him something along the lines of, "now's the time to make your move, you introverted idiot - stop being such a wuss and stand up for yourself for once."

Sasuke glared silent but slightly embarrassed replies at her as she stumbled away. He cleared his throat uncomfortably. Thanks to Sakura, he was now very much aware of how alone he and Naruto really were. The dancing girls must have all gone home sometime in the night while Sasuke'd slept, and the bartender was nowhere to be found. Besides the few snoring drunks, he and Naruto were the only ones left. "Think she'll be alright on her own?" Sasuke asked, making an attempt at avoiding any kind of awkwardness. However, his voice did come out at an embarrassingly high pitch.

Naruto turned to him with slightly amused eyes. "I'm sorry, did you really just squeak?" He laughed a little.

"Shut up," Sasuke mumbled, blushing slightly. If it were anybody but Naruto, he would have liked to punch them right on the nose (not that Sasuke actually had enough balls to do something like that, but still...). As it was, raging teenage hormones were playing wildly with his sense of sanity, and the dark, practically empty bar - not to mention the meaningful look that Sakura had given him - were all really pushing Sasuke over the edge. He looked up at his blonde obsession and wanted to do no more than to snog him senseless.

Naruto smirked again suddenly, and that was about the time when Sasuke realized he was staring. "What was that look for, my precious teme?" Naruto asked, crouching down to look at Sasuke's burning face. "You know, you blush at the weirdest times."

"For someone who spent the night drinking and sitting in the lap of some belly dancer, you sure don't sound very drunk," Sasuke hissed.

"Yeah well, Kyuubi doesn't really give me a choice in the matter of being drunk or not. He makes that decision for me - apparently it's annoying to him whenever I can't function properly."

Sasuke stared up at him with wide eyes. "So you can't get drunk?" he asked bluntly. He hadn't known that. Really, Naruto seemed like the type of person who lived inside a bar, and yet it was a wonder to Sasuke that the blonde boy didn't sneak in to these kind of unruly places more often.

"Unfortunately," Naruto confirmed, grinning. "I've heard it's quite fun, but I've only been allowed to experience it once myself. Kyuubi put it to a stop after that. But oh well. It's fun to pretend, and fun to watch other people." He frowned suddenly. "By the way, did you really not have a good time at all? The whole point of sneaking in here was to give you a good birthday bang. I'd feel like a right asshole if it was actually that terrible."

Sasuke stared guiltily down at the floor. As mean as he usually was to the dobe, he didn't want to say "I didn't have any fun at all" when Naruto had gone through all the trouble to get them in. "It was fine. I mean, it got me away from the fangirls anyway."

The famous Uzumaki grin broke it's way across Naruto's face, causing Sasuke's breath to catch for a second. His heart had decided to momentarily stop beating, too. "Thank Kami-sama for that," Naruto exclaimed with a small relieved sigh. "I'd have been bummed if I thought tonight was a total waste."

A waste...? Sasuke thought. Suddenly the image of Naruto making out with that woman flashed across his mind, and he looked away from Naruto's face, suddenly unable to look into those blue eyes. "You got to suck face with some chick," he muttered, feeling that icy sting in his chest again. Jealousy -- pain. "Was that a 'total waste'?"

Naruto shrugged. "I've made out with chicks before. It's really not all it's cracked up to be. Not that I'm saying you shouldn't try it though." He reached out and playfully punched Sasuke lightly on the jaw. "You really should learn to live a little, Sasuke."

"Tch. I've lived enough." He pushed Naruto's hand away, and the blonde boy laughed. "C'mon," Naruto said. "Let's get out of this bar. I was thinking I could crash at your place. Been a while since I've stayed over there."

It was true that Naruto, being himself, had once upon a time gone out every night and stay out 'til late. Sasuke'd known it for himself, because each one of those nights Naruto went out, he'd show up at Sasuke's door sometime in the early morning, wondering if he might stay over for a little while. Eventually, for reasons unknown to Sasuke, the blonde boy had stopped going out. For a while, Sasuke had just thought that Naruto had merely stopped coming over. It'd been a strangely forgotten-about feeling, and it had made Sasuke depressed for some slight time, until he'd found out that Naruto had just lost interest in being out on the town.

So, it was true that he really hadn't been over in a while, especially not this late at night/early in the morn. The sun was just rising as they made their way tiredly inside the Uchiha complex, both of them laughing a little. Naruto was being an idiot. He'd managed to momentarily bring out his inner comedian, and was cracking jokes left and right - most of them stupid, and not really making any sense, but he was good at making Sasuke laugh. He was one of the few who could, and gee, I wonder why?

Sasuke, who had slept uncomfortably at the bar before, was ready for his soft, comfortable bed, and retrieved some blankets and such for Naruto so that the other boy could sleep on the couch. However, once Sasuke made his way back to the living room, he was surprised to find it empty. "Naruto?" he asked aloud, dropping the pile of pillows and sheets upon the vacant couch. With a bad feeling forming in his stomach, Sasuke was about to go check his bedroom, when Naruto suddenly appeared in the kitchen doorway. "Sorry. Needed a little something less throat-burning than alcohol."

Oh. He'd just wanted a glass of water. Sasuke breathed a sigh of relief - he knew that Naruto knew the other bedrooms in the house weren't used - besides his own of course. For a moment he'd been afraid that Naruto wanted to sleep in his bed. That would have been awkward and embarrassing, especially seeing as Sasuke had things in there he didn't want Naruto to see.

Like the assortment of pictures of the dobe he'd collected from Sakura - she'd had her faithful fan club girls take the shots for him. She'd told them that Sasuke was planning on doing something malicious to Naruto, and therefore needed as many pictures of the guy as he could get. It had been a flimsy excuse, but those girls would do just about anything if they thought that it would make Sasuke happy, and had been quite thorough of getting pictures for him. Sasuke even had a few shots of Naruto in the bathhouse. Did that make him gross and perverted? Because he was completely willing to be considered such if it meant he was able to check out Naruto's hot bod any time he wanted.

Sasuke kept the stash of pictures hidden under his mattress of course, (where else?), and he was terrified that anyone in his bedroom would immediately sniff them out. That was the price that came with guilt - the constant worry that someone was going to find out. Although by now, Sasuke was pretty much sure that he'd learned to live with it. Guilt was everywhere, when one was in love with one's best friend.

So, Sasuke left Naruto to his own devices in the living room, and headed for his bedroom to change. It was with his luck however, that halfway through undressing, the Uzumaki himself made his way sluggishly into the bedroom, and unceremoniously collapsed onto the bed. Sasuke felt his face go up in flames. "What are you doing?" he demanded in that infuriating squeak again.

Naruto laughed sleepily at Sasuke's quick attempts to cover himself. He yawned as he said, "You know, it's funny that everyone thinks you're such a badass. You're so modest it's almost embarrassing to me." He pressed his face into Sasuke's pillow, and inhaled deeply. "Have I ever told you that you smell really good? Honestly Sasuke I think Sakura has too much influence over you. Men just aren't supposed to smell like this."

Sasuke could have melted into a puddle on the floor. He tugged a fresh shirt on over his head - yes, a pajama shirt; he wasn't like the dobe, who just slept in his underwear. Which reminded him....

"Gah!" Sasuke's entire body went rigid, and he spun on his heels as Naruto promptly began to undress. Apparently the dobe had gotten so into the habit of sleeping with only his boxers on, that any time he even wanted to take a nap he was forced to strip. It was a learned habit - he simply couldn't fall into unconsciousness with his clothes on, short of someone knocking him out with drugs or something.

"C'mon Sasuke, just let me sleep in here this once. Look, I even saved enough room for you. C'mon." Sasuke's fists clenched at his sides, and he was working very, very hard to hold in the bursting nose bleed he felt coming on. Shirtless (not to mention pantless) Naruto was someone he could not deal with right now. "Oi, what's the matter with you? What? My being half naked actually embarrasses you?" Sasuke said nothing, and after a minute, Naruto scoffed. "Why do you gotta be like that Sasuke - we're both guys. Jeez."

Even Sasuke's ears were burning now. Naruto really did a job of throwing the Uchiha's nerves into the blender - he always managed to mess him up. It was maddening.

After another short minute, Sasuke heard said infuriating blonde boy huff loudly, and the sounds of the blankets moving against one another. "Look, I'm all covered up. Are you happy now? Can we just get some sleep please?"

As daring as he could be, Sasuke risked a glance over his shoulder, only to see the slightly comical sight of Naruto's blonde head poking out from beneath the red bed sheets. He really was all covered up - bundled tightly into the sheets from the chin down. "Feh," Naruto scoffed, frowning at him. "Now pull the stick out of your ass and finish getting dressed Mrs. Ice Princess. You look like if you blush any harder you're going to start bleeding from the ears."

A/N: Yes, I know that the storyline isn't going the way I described it in the summary - or at least, not yet. But oh, it will happen.