And let’s not pad things. This is even assuming Bernice is telling the whole truth.
The way she’s been written, it’s not much of a stretch to suspect that she’s already “protecting” Piro by glossing over that he in fact mentioned Luann, and perhaps others, as people that he plans to see or touch base with.
He talked quite a bit about having a daily routine of getting his siblings ready in the morning, etc.
He sounds to me like the type that gets the job done, but at least occasionally gets burnt out/overwhelmed and drops out to get out from under it sometimes.
I don’t remember that from the last arc he was in. There was a lot of revelation about the details of how much of a mess his life was.
Mother’s medical woes. His responsibilities caretaking/raising his siblings. Stepfather who made little to no effort to uphold his responsibilities, let alone actually be a good parent. How dismissive/hostile his stepfather is towards him.
But his actually quitting school altogether to deal with all of that is new information, isn’t it?
I don’t know, I think maybe we’re missing the obvious.
After all these years of reader speculation about every new character from Phil to Monstro being gay, the whole strip eventually wraps up going fade to black with Luann and Bernice going hotsy totsy for each other.
“Ohhhh…. B…. Ohhhh, Lu!… ::sigh::”
Answer right there in front of our faces, in that same old bedroom the whole time. ;-)
Nostalgia points for using “hauled” in a way I haven’t heard in years and years and years. ;-)