I'm Doing Just Fine

Regardless if he temporarily left Raymonde to join the circus or if he left the circus to later go into the care of Raymonde, I think everything plays out quite similarly.

Jean-Paul meets several people he considers close friends (wether or not these feelings are reciprocated are up for debate). However he does make lifelong friends with Clementine D’Arbanville and keeps up with Jaques over the years.

According to the solo series Northstar enjoys his time at the circus. He becomes an acrobat and gets a taste for fame. The circus is later revealed to me a front for a terrorist group and exploring Jean-Paul's anger the manage to get him to use his powers to help them.

However he does end up changing his mind when the group tries to bomb a bus station and risks his life to help the passengers caught in the crossfire.

Despite the fact that nobody died, when brought back to the site of the attempted bombing Jean-Paul begins to panic and claims that he killed them.

Granted he also hadn't slept in days, so he's not in the greatest mindset.

After betraying his group and the police closing in on Cell Combattre I think from here Northstar moved to Paris with Mariel and Yves, and after that relationship fell apart he moved back to Montreal to be with Raymonde and became a skier.

The rest they say is history.

However I do think Northstar thwarting the bombing resulted in the fracturing of many of his relationships in Cell Combattre. Or revealing what they were actually doing, using him to achieve an end goal.

I don't think Jean-Paul realizes this, because he's not panicked or concerned in Marvel Fanfare when he tries to rescue two of his old colleagues from a serial killer and they try to shoot him out of the belief that he's gone fully turncoat.

So wether or not Northstar realizes just how messed up his "friends" were or wether they actually cared about him is up for debate.

All in all I think his experience in the circus formed Jean-Paul into the person he is in comics today.