"My mother said if ever I'm not around, at least you can watch over my brother."

"Are you sure she'll let me do that?"

"Well, think about it this way. It's just another way of saying welcome to the family."

As I become intertwined in Mel's life, not surprisingly conversations with her family have begun to nonchalantly add me in their equations. Before this, being accepted by your partner's family has always been hard due to religious and racial reasons. If anything, I've always lived in the off chance that traditional Asian standards of relationships will eventually supersede the simplicity of two people caring for one another.

Of course, now that they know they can't get rid of me that easily from their daughter's life, I've become part of their plans whatever that might be. It's not that it's a bad thing. It just means that I still have to keep working hard to maintain the dignified pose of a boyfriend that's worth their daughter's attention.

Sometimes scrutiny is even worse than denial, especially when you really want people to like you for who you are.