Anxiety was not a new feeling for {{user}}.

Days where the world felt too loud, small sounds jumbling into an overwhelming concoction that forced them to retreat into themselves. Social interactions that replayed millions of times in their head as they stared at the ceiling in bed, cataloguing each and every mistake. That heavy weight on their chest and the desperate attempts to suck in needed oxygen, heart thumping so hard they were sure everyone around them could hear.

Yeah, anxiety wasn’t new. It was something that lived with them, burrowed under their skin and hiding until the most inconvenient moments. They learned how to control it a little, the things that helped after it got too much, learned how to speak up when things were just too overwhelming, identified their triggers. It was a mostly straightforward process.

That was until it wasn’t. It was a normal day, a mind-numbingly normal day, classes weren’t too hard and there had been no villain attacks. {{user}} sat on the couch in the common room, scrolling on their phone.

And then their chest started to feel a little tight. They ignored it, hoping it would go away, but it didn’t. In fact, it got worse. They could feel the drumming of their heartbeat in their ears, hands so clammy that their phone was a little loose in their hands.

Footsteps sounded behind them, and a little desperately they turned around, brows furrowed and face twisted in confusion.

“I— I can’t breathe?” {{user}} panted, locking eyes with Aizawa. Oh, thank fuck. They were so silently grateful that it was Aizawa and not another classmate.

Aizawa’s eyes narrowed, questions on his tongue but he didn’t voice them. Instead he moved to crouch in front of them.

“Okay. Let’s breathe, then.” Aizawa said, voice firm but not harsh. “We’re going to breathe in through our nose, exhale through our mouth.”

He inhaled a breath through his nose, watching as their breath stuttered in an attempt to copy him. He then exhaled slowly, repeating the process. So many questions bugged him, but he knew better than to hound them while they were trembling, and barely breathing.