What was that initial Roxy thought. Oh yeah- it's a little abstract so it's hard to put into words, but in a nutshell it has to do with his classpect and self-denial of identity. All void players that we see in HS have something funky going on with their identity, either in a literal sense (Horuss and his plurality. Yes he is plural but also poking fun of a very specific subset of very online plurals on tumblr who have essentially fallen down a rabbithole of escapism instead of taking newly permanent awareness day-by-day, working with their system, and eventually recovering. I actually have a lot to say about Horuss and his plurality and what I think Hussie meant by all that, both the good, the neutral, and the bad, but that's a different post. This is Roxy's post.), or in a way that they're struggling with some or all aspects of their identity.
Equius is too STRONG which affects pretty much every aspect of his life, and he's also got masses of, again, very online-typical white guy insecurities. Roxy himself is devastatingly insecure in his identity, his social standing, and also his relationships, or - importantly - lack thereof for all of HS1.
IDENTITY ISSUES aren't a Roxy-exclusive trait. Pretty much every single character in homestuck struggles with this, which makes sense because in many ways The Game is an analogy for growing up. The transition from childhood to 'adulthood' (teenage years), to actual adulthood which is achieved (if you're lucky) post-Game. However, I think the Void aspect in itself, while also representing literal void, the spaces between things, secrets, etc, also encompasses mysteries of the self.
Note also that all Void players in HS struggle with interpersonal relationships, particularily romance, and that their VOIDY IDENTITY ISSUES are either a major, or even the main player IN their relationship troubles. Specifically of the flushed quadrant. Romance seems to be an issue for Void players, which makes sense to me because romance and any other close relationships can get messy quickly if you don't have a solid grasp of yourself and are the type to lash out or meddle with your intended flushed partner because of said issues, which Roxy, Horuss, and Equius all do.
Roxy blows up at Dirk for being gay and because Roxy is (miserably, to them) a girl, which makes them incompatible, nevermind that Dirk does love Roxy, he just can't love them in the way that they want. Horuss overloads Rufioh with affection while also trying to maintain a forced cheerfulness at the request of someone higher up the caste system, which is a Thing with Zahhaks. And Equius......... made Aradiabot. Because he was struggling to comprehend his flushed feelings for someone so much lower than he is on the same caste system. These are all under what I would call identity issues, because all three characters are struggling against social constructs (gender, sexuality labels, a caste system) that they believe are cemented in stone. But what happens if you break out a chisel and hammer? That's where Roxy's two routes in the Epilogues come in.
Note that Roxy's crush on Dirk seemed to fizzle out sometime and/or possibly immediately after the trickster incident. Roxy certainly never meaningfully talked about it again, which makes me think that it's just too painful or embarassing. There was definite guilt, which I can see had a big hand in Roxy's sudden aversion towards Dirk, which might even be mirrored in Dirk himself. (They also might actually never exchange words again after that?? At least on screen, which is important because Hussie only shows us what she really wants us to see and also what's important for us to know, so in turn the absence of something is also very important in HS <- Hey look, another Void reference)
Regardless- Roxy in HS1 seems to catch feelings for John fairly quickly. It's almost like they trauma bonded, actually- being the only two survivors left of their original doomed timeline. John is also like, at the time the 3rd guy Roxy had ever met in real life who could concievably be a viable option for her. In comes comphet into the scene, which both Roxy AND John suffer from, unknowningly. Of course Roxy would want to stick close to John. Of COURSE Roxy would start crushing- John saved her life, right after she lost everyone she cared about or loved or could've possibly loved. That must feel like fate, right? It'd certainly feel like fate to me
So finally, Roxy has met the prince charming to her sleeping beauty (Crossover Disney refrance, I know, whatevs), of course she wouldn't want to let him go. Of course she'd put massive fucking personal, identity shifting stakes into whatever John chose in the first chapter of the Epilogues, before the timeline split.
John staying compounds both of their comphet, because Roxy is deep in dreamland, and John is floating above life just enough to never question why he feels so bad, at least not until they've already had a baby. They essentially forcefem and forcemasc themselves, not in a fun kinky way, through their entire relationship- and we see John be unnerved by it! We also eventually see Roxy reflecting on her performative femininity, that at some point it really was for John. She thought that's what she had to do as 'a woman' to keep her 'man', and combined with John's complacency, it just made them both miserable. As they've always been, arguably since we were first introduced to both of them
But John leaving suddenly gives both of them space to breathe (Haha). It hurt at first, we see that in Roxy's reaction when John chooses meat, but the sudden void in his life gives him room to breathe. Suddenly, what was exaserbating Roxy's comphet (the promise of a boyfriend, husband, father to her children so she can be The Mother Of All Time) is gone, so... the inner walls of his shell start to look less glamourous. And in turn, I think that if John lived through his decision to fight LE, we would've been seeing June a lot sooner.
We've seen a Void/Breath pair mix badly before (Horuss and Rufioh) in a surprisingly similar way- where the Void player smothers the Breath player in what they think their partner wants, and the Breath player, despite any actual internal complexities they may have, just kind of... floats along with it. Either through a lack of will (Rufioh), or because they can't get a firm enough grasp on themselves to even begin to talk about it (John).
It's like these two aspects create a vortex in isolation with each other. With Roxy and John's case in Candy, they just end up reinforcing each other's uncracked eggs. Very fucking fascinating shit. I don't know if Roxy's egg cracking sooner would've changed anything between him and Dirk, because Dirk's platonic feelings for Roxy are devastatingly important, but I do think Roxy needed to be isolated from his compcis triggers first to kickstart ANY personal growth, which Dirk was at the time. Dirk's surprised stumbling when he sees Roxy post-transition in Meat is also interesting to me and I hope to see more for them at some point. Yeah. Meds are working now and making me gradually incomprehensible, send post
