Yesterday, Fareeha felt fine. She wasn't nervous, or scared. If anything, she was excited.
Unfortunately, that was no longer the case as every minute that passed filled her with an unending sense of dread. At first, she easily dealt with it. She'd managed to do her light makeup for the day, easily put her suit on, she'd even managed to recite all of her vows off by heart (although she was still taking the scrap of paper with them on with her anyway) without so much as a nervous shake. It was only when Jesse showed up with the rings did her nerves take a sudden nose dive.
"Are you having second thoughts?" Ana asked after Fareeha had been staring at the ground for five minutes without so much as making a move to finish getting ready.
"No!" The word came out harsher than she had intended it to and she winced. "I'm sorry. I just…I don't know…I want to do this. I want to get married. I'm just nervous.".
Fareeha felt the space next to her on the sofa shift, followed by Jesse's arm wrapping around her and pulling her into a side hug. "Now c'mon, 'Ree. You've gone into numerous war zones, and you're nervous about a wedding?"
Fareeha considered his words for a moment, letting the thought he planted settle in her mind before she responded. "Honestly, I'd rather be going into a war zone."
Fareeha watched as Ana shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose before grabbing the red tie that was meant to complete Fareeha's suit. Her mother knelt down in front of her and began putting on the tie.
"Fareeha, I know how much you both want this. I've seen how much the two of you have been looking forward to today." Ana said as she focused on finishing the tie. "I never got married, so I don't fully know how you feel, but if you are truly scared from just the anticipation, just focus on how good it will feel when you're finally married.".
Fareeha let out a quiet noise of acknowledgement as she stared at her shoes while Ana stood up. Jesse stood a moment later, grabbing Fareeha's hand and pulling her up also. Her body felt like lead as she felt her mother's and best friend's eyes upon her.
"Wow, 'Ree." Jesse breathed out.
"Who knew my daughter could be so handsome?" Ana beamed directly after.
Fareeha forced herself to look up, and felt tears fill her eyes at the pride in Jesse's and Ana's. She fought her nerves to ask if she truly looked okay, and even managed a laugh when Jesse commented about how Angela was one hell of a lucky woman.
It was that comment that made her wonder how her fiancée was faring and after a moment's thought, she decided that Angela was probably nowhere near as terrified as she was.
Angela was not faring well at all. She'd felt fine all morning, joking around with her brother and best friend, but when it came time for her to go to the bathroom to put her dress on, she very nearly had a panic attack.
She sat on the toilet seat and stared at the dress that was hanging against the door. The perk of getting married in Ilios was that she could comfortably sit in just her underwear without freezing while she had an internal meltdown from all the stress of the upcoming events.
She was pulled from the white static of her mind by a faint knock on the door. "Angela, are you okay?" It was Falke. When she didn't answer, he knocked again. "Are you decent?"
Realising that he was going to come in unless she said something, she forced out a quiet, "no." To ensure she was heard, she spoke again, "no, I'm not."
She could hear quiet whispering beyond the door. Next time someone addressed her, it was Genji. "Can I come in?"
She considered her answer for a moment. If she let him in, he'd see her in her underwear, but then again, it wasn't as if it was anything he hadn't seen before. Besides, he was arguably one of the people she was most open with, next to Falke. The only person she was more open with was Fareeha.
"You can come in." She mumbled when she made her mind up, barely loud enough to be heard. Genji slipped through the door with such speed that if Angela hadn't been watching it from the corner of her eye, she would've missed it.
"You're not even dressed yet?" He asked, glancing to the dress next to him. Angela tried to answer, but the sound caught in her throat as tears she didn't even know she'd been fighting back began to fall.
Genji rushed forward and wrapped his arms around her in a tight hug. "Oh, Angela." She wrapped her arms around him and she sobbed into the cool metal of his shoulder. He gently shushed her, slowly rubbing a hand up and down her back in a soothing motion until her tears slowed.
When he moved back from the hug, Angela wiped at where her tears had fallen. "I'm sorry, I'm just so scared and excited about today I just didn't know what to do." She pulled her hand away and saw a wet, black smudge. She ruined her makeup. "I'm sorry."
Genji grabbed for some toilet paper, wet it and used the tissue to wipe the remainder from her face. "Don't worry, I'll fix it after you have your dress on.". His scarred lips curled up in a smile as he threw the tissue away and helped her stand before turning to grab her dress.
When they both emerged from the bathroom, Falke was half reclined on the sofa on his phone. Angela had enough time to see that he was messaging Jesse before her brother saw her and locked the phone, so he could stand and look at her, tears coming to his eyes.
"There's my beautiful, big sister." He stepped forward to hug her as Genji fetched his makeup kit.
As Angela sat down to let Genji redo her makeup, she did her best to swallow her nerves down and let the excitement grow for the day ahead.
In the months leading up to the wedding, Fareeha and Angela had debated back and forth whether they'd go down the aisle together or not. It was due to a long discussion four days ago that Fareeha was walking towards the alter with only her mother at her side, her father having gone up the aisle first with Jesse closely behind him.
Fareeha walked by all her friends and from her peripheral vision, she could see them all turning to look at her and smiling. It did nothing to help her current anxieties, and thus she focused solely on Reinhardt who would be officiating. When she finally reached the front, it took a remarkable amount of strength to keep her legs from giving out from under her.
She watched as her mother walked off to stand to her right, Ana immediately beginning to quietly banter back and forth with Sam. Fareeha glanced over to Jesse, who gave her a reassuring smile. She took a deep breath to try and steady the remaining nerves, but the effort was in vain as Lucio started playing the entrance music for the other bridal party, which meant only one thing.
Angela was here.
Genji arrived at the front first, Zenyatta closely behind him. She hoped that with how quickly they appeared, that Angela too would appear quickly, so she could focus so intensely on how undoubtedly gorgeous she looked, that she forgot all her nerves.
The time it took for Angela to reach the alter seemed never ending, but eventually Fareeha saw white out of the corner of her vision and saw Falke stepping away to take up his spot on Angela's left.
She turned to look at Angela, ready to recite the compliment on her appearance that she had recited for days leading up the event, but found her breath stolen from her lungs when saw her.
"Wow…" was all she managed.
Angela herself appeared at a loss for words, but eventually settled for, "You look amazing!"
Reinhardt cleared his throat and began his speech. It fell on deaf ears, at least in regard to Angela and Fareeha. The two women stared at each other, and with each passing moment their grins grew wider as the stress began to melt away. This was really happening.
Fareeha was so entranced by the woman in front of her that it took her mother hastily whispering, "your vows!" for her to snap out of her stupor.
Her mind drew a blank as she drew the paper from her pocket, glancing between it and Angela as she read. "Angela. You are the most beautiful and intelligent woman I have ever met. No one has ever made me so thankful to be able to fake confidence as you have, especially in the times where I was so scared of asking you something I considered running away to Antarctica." The wedding party chuckled as did Angela, who covered her mouth with her hand. "I love you, and every day you are with me is the best day of my life. I'm so lucky to have you, and I can't wait for you to be my wife.".
The crowd let out a chorus of 'awws' as Angela carefully wiped at her eyes. When it was her turn to speak, she didn't need a piece of paper to remind her.
"Fareeha. I have never met anyone like you, and no one has ever made me as happy as you have. Every day I feel like the luckiest woman alive to have you and I hope to have you for the rest of my life, even with all your awful puns." Again, the crowd laughed as Fareeha smiled adoringly.
Reinhardt then called for the rings, Jesse grinning madly as he walked over and handed the gold band to Angela and the blue tinted band to Fareeha. With shaking hands, they carefully placed the bands on the others finger.
"If there are any reasons why these two should not be married, please speak now or forever hold your peace." Fareeha just caught sight of Lena's smirk as she began to raise her hand, Amélie grabbing it and slowly moving it back to her lap while Emily glared at her. "Then I now pronounce you wife and wife. You may kiss."
They wrapped their arms around each other as their lips met.
They had never been happier than in that moment.