Yeah. . . .

Believe me, I tried very, very hard not to fall in love with her.

She's had a crush on me since she was 5 but it wasn't like this back then.

She figured out I was a girl-lover and decided to take advantage of that.

Not that I fault her for it.

Over the last few years our relationship became so strong that it was just starting to become romantic on its own.

And my family is blaming me. I would never have told them if I had known they would eventually use the information to pressure me into outing myself to the girl's parents.

Now I'm living with my best mate for the time being (thank you) and although he knows, his family mostly doesn't. They might vaguely suspect but they love me too much to care.

So I'm still getting girl time, but my emotional attachment to my niece is keeping it to a pretty soft level. I can't seem to give up on the hope that we may one day be reunited. She's the only girl I have ever met whom I would happily, without a shred of a doubt, spend the rest of my life together with.

Keep in mind she's not biologically related to me. She's my half-brother's step-daughter. She's never called me uncle, we were both kids when we met (we're still both pretty much kids), we saw each other once a month tops, and we ended up falling in love in my backyard (pretty much).

Communication between myself and her parents has ceased. There's not much I can do at this point anymore besides let her come to me whenever she's ready and has the freedom to do so.