Free The Light of Day by Kristen Kehoe

up with Jake so the Scientist and Max could stand next to each other after the original procession.  Standing there pressed against him, his broad chest against my back as we smiled for the group photos was almost too much.  Not that he acted any differently.
    When we were taking the photos, he was relaxed and happy, and now that we’ve been freed he’s removed his jacket (an act which I can only hope Auntie Mags skins him for) and is talking intently to Ryan’s sister, Caitlin, and Mia’s brother, Joshua, the other Murphy/Evans love affair.
    He hasn’t tried to talk to me once, only making funny little comments as Auntie Mags and the wedding coordinator fluttered around us making certain we were all put together perfectly for each photo.  When we were finished, he squeezed my shoulder, gave me a small smile, and walked a little bit away to where he is now.  He never even mentioned living together, and goddammit, wasn’t it his idea?
    To say I need a distraction is an understatement of epic proportion.
    Even after my run this morning, I haven’t been able to clear my head enough and rationalize why Jake living with me is the worst idea on the planet.  I mean, the boy screams player and I just got out of the game.  Wouldn’t living with him be like settling a sugar addict in a cake shop and telling her good luck?
                  Which prompts me to wonder if cake can be that horrible for you.  I mean, really, is sugar the worst addiction a person can have? It’s not crack.
                  Christ, I’m even attacking my analogies.
                  When my father steps up next to me, I wish fervently that I was still outside suffering the tortures of the photographer, wedding planner, and Auntie Mags.  At least then I was simply expected to do as I was told without responding.  One look at my father’s face tells me he won’t be as easy to be around.  Which is promptly followed by feelings of guilt for being such a bitch.
                  He’s not a bad man, he simply had the bad luck to be flexible in a marriage where his partner was anything but.  As a result, we both suffered, and after a while, that suffering was no longer something we bonded over.
                  “Cora, you look beautiful.”  He leans in to kiss my cheek and I keep my hands clasped in front of me, though I tilt my chin for him.
                  He steps back and for a second I’m thrown into the past and the memories of the many social functions my mother dragged us to.  I would stand in the corner and pout, wearing whatever hateful and overly fussy dress she had forced on me, vowing revenge on her for plunking me down in her social life as a prized pony and then ignoring me.  Before long, my father would sidle up to me, hand me a Shirley Temple and stand next to me.  We’d never really speak, no more than a comment here or there, but by the time he walked away, I was no longer unhappy.
    It went on like that until I got old enough to stop caring what my mother wanted, which was about the exact same time she stopped caring what I did.  My father never stopped caring what she wanted, and in the end, he chose her and I chose to go my own way.  The road back has been hard on both of us.
                  Tonight he looks almost as I remember him, though, dashing as ever in his perfectly tailored suit, his brown hair now almost fully gray.  Though he’s just over sixty, older than many parents of kids my age as I was the one and only baby my mother conceived and kept from giving up in the womb after years of trying, he’s an attractive man, with a strong jaw and broad shoulders, a long frame that he handed down to me.  The only real difference comes from the fact this his normally content face is much thinner with deep lines, that weren’t there even last year, etched into it.  And still, he smiles at me.  I don’t know if it’s that or