#inspired by the doodle im currently doing of him being plagued with gay thoughts about sk and he looks visibly freaked the fuck out

[struck-by-the-rain]

im thinking maybe hcing that joe thought he was aroace most of his life before meeting sk just for projection reasons? like I don't know, he's very emotionally repressed/stunted and also doesn't have anyone close enough to him to develop feelings for? and he's also convinced that he's not like,,, made for love or being loved or anything, so idk I could imagine himself feeling like he's not capable of that sort of attraction and repressing away any crushes he does develop...

idk obviously I don't like the tropes that aro/ace ppl just haven't met the right person yet, but I'm grey aroace n it's an experience I kind of relate to? like I've gone through long periods of not feeling any sorta attraction to anyone, especially when living at home not around anyone my type, and I've wondered if I was 100% aroace during those times. And because of various self esteem issues I struggle to see myself as someone ppl would be attracted to or wanna date etc and I think that affects how I think about my orientation? and I'm autistic so it makes my relationship w sexuality/romance/whatever weird and confusing

idk I think all of those things could be applicable to joe. he won't let anyone to be close to his heart and is rly used to repressing away his emotions, so I think he could believe he was fully aroace (I'm not sure if he'd know about the label, maybe he'd describe it in a diff way) until sk came crashing into his life. ye tldr i rly like the idea of grey aroace joe (not to be tooo projectiony lol)