Selective Relationships and Such - In depth (No charts here, folks)
Riza Hawkeye
"Riza is, hands down, one of Roy's favorite and most important people. She's a sister, a friend, a confidant, so much more that even he can't put into words, and more still that he probably doesn't even realize. He doesn't like seeing her hurt, frightened or depressed, and if it came down to it, he'd willingly play the fool if it would alleviate her pain for even a little while. He also trusts her with his life but would sacrifice himself in a heartbeat if it meant her safety, even though he knows that might not go over so well after what she told him; he's wary of wanting to go back into any profession would cause her to worry about him.
Despite all this, he knows she's every bit as strong and skilled as he is, if not more so (alchemy notwithstanding), and it bothers him to hear her talk down about her capabilities because without her, he loses something more than just another supporter, he loses someone very dear to him. His goal has always been to be one of the cornerstones for his country to rest upon, but with someone to care about and look out for (and vice versa), it strengthens that goal and makes it more personal, so he's less likely to lose sight of it.
In a way, he feels indebted to her because she "created" him in that she granted him her father's knowledge which gave birth to the Flame Alchemist, and even though he's had his slip-ups, she hasn't cast him aside and wiped her hands of him. Knowing that he's put her through so much pain and heartache though -even if it technically wasn't him who died in front of her- only makes him want to work harder to get it right so that he'll never again be the cause of her suffering.
Basically, he respects and adores her, and would do anything to keep her from sadness on his account. As for just how deep that adoration runs and what face it takes? Who knows.
[...]
The tattoo is something he has rather mixed feelings about. On one hand, it provided him the means with which to fight for what he believed in and protect others. On the other hand, it symbolizes a broken promise as he swore to never use its secrets for the wrong reasons, yet in Ishbal, he did just that. And his attempt to rid her of it -though she had asked- left behind the visible scars on her body that mirror the ones on his heart from how he failed her. He doesn't see it as an eyesore or something to be ashamed of, though, because it's a part of Riza, and (to be completely and bluntly honest) he really can't see her as anything other than what she is: beautiful. Her personality, her strength, her loyalty, her very being... she is absolutely beautiful in his eyes, though he won't say it aloud.
While he can understand the alchemist's desire to protect their research, keep it from prying eyes, and ensure that it would never be used by the wrong party, he can't understand the father's justification for the methods used to do it. He can't fathom what must have been going through Berthold's head when Riza was tattooed, not just because it was a tremendous burden to be placing on her shoulders (literally), but because it was almost as though she was being condemned to a life of solitude in order to protect that secret. However, it also was a testament to how much the man trusted her and believed her worthy of that trust. It isn't that Roy's opinion of his teacher was changed, but there's more uncertainty toward the man's reasoning and thought process where before there had been little.
As for his opinion of Riza, the fact that she was so loyal to her father's wishes, safeguarding her back until she found someone she felt she could entrust the information to is a small part of the reason he feels he can trust her implicitly. He's saddened by the fact that she had to endure such pain in order to become the research, so to speak, and that because of it, she'd almost have to be careful of who she's with in the event they're able to take what's left of the tattoo and somehow decipher it. He blames himself for being unable to rid her of it in a way that didn't leave her permanently scarred, and if there had been any other way to do it at the time without hurting her, he would have. He'd really have preferred that she not have been inked in the first place, but he knows he can't change what happened and the only thing he can think of to make it up to her is to make sure she has no reason to shed a tear over him. After that moment in which she'd revealed her back to him, his view of her was strengthened because here was a woman who was incredibly loyal to her duty, a woman who was trustworthy and strong enough to withstand the restrictions placed upon her by bearing that sigil on her skin, and over the course of time, that view has never wavered, only grown stronger."
-Taken from this meme.
Since arriving in Anatole, he's been forced to take himself apart and look closely at what's there where Riza is concerned several times -over the course of a three day span during the BlackWater event in which Riza disappeared while in the Ruins with Cara and Spike only to have her come home safe and sound, following the AU event (details can be found here), during a counseling session with Galatea in which he attempted to talk to someone in hopes he could figure out what was wrong with him, during the Charity Dating Auction when he overstepped his financial means in a fruitless effort to try and win a 2-hour "date" with her (he gave up when he realized it was more than he could afford and walked out so he wouldn't have to see the end), while pelting her with snowballs after coaxing her outside in order to get an answer from him on the subject, and culminating in an actual admittance during the No Lying event. Unfortunately, he's never been incredibly affectionate and he has a tendency to hide the truth behind seemingly pointless banter so he doesn't know how to express himself when it comes to a real relationship.
He's shown that in addition to his rather explosive temper, he has a high reserve of derp and while he's actually quite intelligent, he's also a little dense when it comes to anything involving normal life situations and himself. This doesn't help him in dealing with Riza who wants him to be open with her as he tends to either miss her meaning or wrap his own words in such a way that she has difficulty understanding them. He's also discovered that he hates using voice messages, preferring video where she's involved because that way he doesn't need words to communicate with her, but the more he's forced to delve into his own emotional state, the more afraid he is of using any sort of video lest she see that he really isn't as strong as he lets on.
He's admitted he wants her as more than just a friend or subordinate, but while she's admitted the same or close to it, he's absolutely terrified of losing her as a friend should they try for anything more. He's also afraid of the possibility of losing her to anyone else. Because of this, his temper has been directed at her over things that would generally be trivial (her memories of the AU event, her dislike of Lust and hurt over his dealings with the homunculus, her friendship with Scar) and although he doesn't necessarily want to fight with her, he has a hard time dealing with jealousy. He's used to being the one people are jealous of, not the one jealous of others.
5/8/2011 EDIT: Roy has since asked her out, and they've not only had their first date, but have gotten much closer to one another after the destruction of the Patrol Headquarters in which Riza was living, since she moved in with him temporarily. Not long after that, her death at the hands of Malfatto pushed him to realize that he does indeed love her -and her loss threatened to shove him off the deep end. After her return, he'd slowly begun getting used to the idea that what he felt for her was more than what he'd thought before... and before anything had a chance to go too far, he discovered the reason people wait to have children/banish pets from beds: LIFERUINERS.
He's only recently returned after having been ripped up by Shadow Creepers and shot in the head at point blank range by Yazoo, and he's already managed to mess up his own relationship by taking a dare he probably shouldn't have, courtesy of Lust. When it comes to outward appearances and meaningless relationships, he can be smooth and suave, but when it comes to Riza and their relationship, it's a different story. As much as he would love to be able to be that smooth and suave guy with her, he actually really LIKES her which makes it hard to be all "Hey~" when what he wants to do is go "aurhgfuasdfewersrwfks".
Scar
"Roy has never really had personal issues with the Ishbalan people (other than the whole "having a former comrade shoot him during the war" thing); he's actually surprisingly tolerant of of other people, and throughout the war, he was constantly questioning the reasons why they were being made to do what they were doing.
That said, because of his participation in the war, he doesn't really blame Scar for having wanted revenge. He isn't terribly fond of him, though he will admit that the animosity felt as enemies has more or less burned off and left him with a grudging respect for the man who was able to take his own terrible past and keep moving forward despite nearly losing himself. In a roundabout way, Scar's ability to do that mirrors his own, and he can see a bit of himself reflected in the Ishbalan.
While that applies to the one he knows from his own time line, he sees no point in distinguishing between the two and he's willing to believe that although the time may be different, what makes Scar who he is is still the same. He might not consider them BFFs, but in his eyes, Scar is a valuable ally and someone worthy of respect.
It also helps that in his eyes, Scar showed a concern for his Lieutenant's welfare by letting him know where she could be found."
-Taken from this meme.
Roy's general view of Scar has not changed much, although he harbored a very mild resentment toward the man after learning how close Scar and Riza were. This resentment was unfounded and based more in jealousy because he saw Riza treating Scar with kindness and kid gloves, yet she had no qualms hitting and yelling at him.
During the No Lying event, he and Scar went at one another's throats, each ripping into the other and drawing as much blood as possible -though Scar's heart wasn't in it and when Roy revealed that it was a homunculus and not Envy who started the horrors of the Ishbal War, Scar went at Lust instead.
He still isn't terribly fond of him, but instead of the jealousy (now that he and Riza have worked things through and agreed to make an attempt at a relationship) it's more because he doesn't know how to apologize to him, and it's easier for him to keep a distance when the wounds caused by his outburst are still rather fresh.
Maes Hughes
Maes Hughes is one of very few people in Roy's life who really knows him. He's one of Roy's best friends, his biggest supporter, one of his closest confidants, and his biggest troll. Always able to annoy him with stories about his beautiful Gracia and darling Elicia, as well as with photos and questions about when Roy intends to settle down and marry, it's rather hard to believe that they didn't get off to a very good start. Despite their rocky beginnings, Maes became one of Roy's nearest and dearest.
When Hughes succumbed to an attack by Envy, it very nearly tore Roy apart, though he kept it hidden and only showed any sort of emotion "in public" when he was alone with Riza after the funeral. Later, that emotion had twisted itself into rage and hatred directed at the one responsible.
It was because of this that he found it hard to accept that the man who showed up in Anatole was actually Maes Hughes, the friend and father, and not Envy in Hughes' form. It took a great deal of convincing on the part of both Riza and Hughes himself to get him to believe that it was indeed his late friend. This was Roy's first time experiencing the idea that people could be pulled into Anatole from drastically different points in time.
Since then, Hughes has been his go-to for things, especially those things involving Riza when he's thought them through to death on his own end and can make neither heads nor tails of them. Roy has even gotten his approval that, should anything happen to him, Hughes would take care of his puppy in his stead. There is only one thing he has yet to really inform Hughes of -the fact that the man can stop getting on his case about finding a girlfriend, because so long as he doesn't blow it, he's already found one.
Lust
Lust is an incredibly difficult one for him to sort out. On one hand, it was Lust who attacked him and his crew beneath Laboratory 3. On the other, it wasn't this Lust, and he knows it. This has led to a lot of mixed feelings concerning her, and has gotten him into more than one argument with Riza about his dealings with her. She seems to have no real love for what she is, and has even met him once in Dismas where he would have had the upper hand. This is where it gets difficult.
Although he knows well what she is, he would be hard pressed not to think her attractive. The playboy attitude he's grown accustomed to using over the years in the military to disguise his actions is one that isn't so easily cast aside, and while he isn't falling all over her (or any other woman for that matter, save one on occasion) he has slipped on two separate occasions where there was something to be gleaned from the encounter that could prove beneficial to him. The first was her memories of a world he didn't know though it was so similar to his own. The second was socialization for Allison.
She does have an annoying tendency to troll both him and Riza, though, and it's because of that that she isn't one of his favorite people. He also knows that Riza hates her and why, but because his mind has already differentiated between the woman who made an attempt on their lives and the woman who is trying to start over in Anatole, he can't hate her because she hasn't done anything to him.
There is also the subject of her puppy, Gluttony. Because of the dog, Roy wishes absolutely no harm whatsoever to Lust, because what would become of the puppy without his mommy there?
During his most recent encounter with Lust (in which he took Allison over to socialize her with other people) they came very near to sleeping together, but before things could progress that far, they stopped. Since then, he hasn't been in the same room with her without others present. He still finds her attractive, but there is somebody who means a lot more to him in his life now and he has no desire to screw up a potentially good thing.