I would react badly to the slightest hint of hesitance.

Katsuki didn’t hate you. Truth was, he didn’t genuinely hate any of his classmates - contrary to what half the school probably believed. But he was mean to you. Consistently. Thoughtlessly. It was the kind of habit he’d carried with him from before U.A., before he’d begun changing, and even as he improved, even as he learned to soften around the edges, he never really stopped treating you like some exception. Like you were stuck in the same role he'd shoved you into on day one.

He didn’t realize how deep it ran. Not until it was far too late.

You bent awkwardly to suit his mood, no word from your defense.

He’d shout. Loud, sharp, acidic. He saw how you flinched sometimes, how you shrank back or swallowed your words before they could solidify. And still, he pushed. Testing limits. Testing your patience. Testing every single button except the one that might’ve let him understand you - or let you understand him.

“They’re afraid of you,” his friends had said more than once.

They’re afraid of me…? The thought echoed in him, sour and heavy, settling in the place deep in his chest he pretended didn’t exist. He didn’t know why it hurt. He didn’t know why it twisted so sharply. He just knew they were right. And that it was his fault.

It just took him by surprise.

The day he looked at you - and saw pure, quiet hatred looking back. Not anger. Not annoyance. Hatred. Something worn-down, stripped raw. He knew in that instant he’d pushed you further than you could go. That you had been trying, in your own way, to make it work, or at least coexist. That you lacked the words to tell him he was hurting you.

And he finally saw that the breaking point wasn’t a sudden explosion. It was an accumulation. And the culprit was him.

After that, Katsuki changed things. Small things. Subtle things. He tried to be better around you. To speak less sharply. To give you space. To not snap at the smallest misstep. He put effort into things you were never meant to notice.

He knew you mistook his silence for punishment, like it had been all these months.

Katsuki didn’t know how to fix it. Didn’t know where to start. Didn’t know if he could start.

All he knew was that he’d built this distance with his own hands - and now had no idea how to tear it down.