One of the things that Riordan didn’t do so well at was showing how the Seven’s experiences as children shaped them later in life. Because anyone who goes through half the stuff that the seven has knows that it leaves its marks.
I don’t care how great of a guy Paul Blofis is - Percy will still watch his every move, checking in with his mom and carefully watching for any sign that she was being mistreated. It happened before and he wouldn’t let it happen again. He flinches every time someone goes to give him a high-five, and while he’s slowly getting better that instinct to duck will never fully go away. People tease him because its weird for a kid his age to be so close to his mother, but he doesn’t care.
It took Annabeth YEARS to get to the point where she trusted Chiron enough to treat him like the father-figure he became. She kept waiting for that other shoe to drop, for him to realize that she wasn’t worth keeping around. Keeps waiting for Sally to turn on her, to say ‘stay away from my family, you aren’t safe’. Except for Percy, there has been no one in her life that she can rely on no matter what. Even though she knows he won’t, there’s a voice in the back of her head that says its only a matter of time until he leaves her too.
Nico wears terrifying clothes not because he’s the son of Hades, but because they scare people away. The less people that are close to him, the smaller the chances of people getting hurt because of him. He’s a control freak - if he is on a quest he plans out every last detail, and he has to run point. He volunteers for every quest that he can. The last time he let someone else lead while he stayed home, Bianca died. He doesn’t want anyone else to have to go through that pain. He hoards food - peanuts, protein bars, things that have lots of protein and fat in them.
Frank lives every day like it’s his last, because it just might be.
Hazel crosses the street when she sees a group of white men, and is extra polite to police officers. She still has to remind herself that she can sit wherever she wants, that she can eat at any restaurant, that she can go to the bathroom in any women’s restroom. She hates swimming more than anything, because she’s seen first-hand what happened to black people who swam in the pool.
Leo wakes up every morning and has to remind himself to smile. He cracks jokes because he can. But also because he thinks that he can’t be too much of a monster if he can make people laugh. He can never get comfortable staying in one place for too long - he’s constantly on edge, waiting to be sent to the next home. He dreams of fiery garages and his friends turning on him, calling him 'el diablo’ before they try and kill him.
And this is before you factor in the PTSD of surviving multiple battles, the worries and fears that go hand-in-hand with being a demigod.
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