25. What do they need and want out of relationships, and how do they go about getting it?
42 Character Development Questions || Accepting, even if it takes me forever
idk why all y’all are so interested in my sewer king (now canon!), but you’re lovely for asking. And with that...
Who. The hell. Knows.
Seriously, he’s...difficult to pin down for this one. But I’mma try!
He loves snarking at and with people. If he gets sassy with someone and they give him as good as they get, there’s a 99% chance he’s going to decide they’re friends. It’s why he actually considers Bobby a friend, even though in basically every panel they’ve ever shared, they’re just ruthlessly taking the piss out of each other the whole time. Jono lives for a good snark exchange.
Also important in romantic relationships and close friendships, and why he doubts he’ll ever find another friend like Angelo: he needs someone who knows him well enough to let him wallow and be miserable when he really needs to, but who will also give him a swift kick when he’s too far in his own head. Essentially, he needs someone who knows he’s got issues and has to have those moments of self-pity but who won’t indulge his worst tendencies and who’ll tell him to stfu and stop whining sometimes. So far, Angelo’s really the only person he’s met who knew exactly how to handle his (often brutal) mood swings (but in the married verse, Pete’s got a knack for it as well).
He can’t deal with bigots and/or people who are just cruel, regardless of their reasoning. Despite his best efforts to present a certain reputation, he’s a good person at heart (so to speak) and has his moments of genuine kindness. As a result, he tends to gravitate toward kind people, or at least the sorts who are capable of kindness. That doesn’t mean they have to be bubbly and cheerful all the time, and in fact, those sorts tend to grate on him very quickly; but someone has to be a basically good person in order for him to have any interest in a friendship or romantic relationship.
Like I said. My boy’s a toasted marshmallow.
As for how he goes about getting these relationships, they just kinda...happen? Like, I don’t think he’s ever been shown to go out of his way trying to win someone over as either a friend or potential romantic interest. It’s not that he doesn’t have a romantic side, but he’s so paranoid about rejection and so messed up by his own self-hatred that he doesn’t let himself show it until the relationship is very well established and he’s confident that making such a gesture won’t get him ridiculed.
The same is true overall for friendships as well. He can be (and usually is) a very loyal and compassionate friend, but only to those he’s given himself permission to trust. He keeps everyone else at a firm distance, and it takes quite a bit to get him to accept them as a “friend” rather than just an “acquaintance.”