Brian de Saint Pern is showing remorse for his heated exchange with Kate Chastain in the December 9 episode of Below Deck.

Things got tense between the Valor crew members in the van on the way back to the boat after their day off. Kate called Brian "the best yachtie" she's ever met. However, the deckhand told the chief stew that he took offense to that term and asked her not to refer to him as a "yachtie." "A lot of people call people in the industry 'yachties,' like as a disrespectful term, like we don't work hard and we just make lots of money," Brian said during an interview in the episode. "I hate that s--t."

Brian then corrected Kate, saying that he is "not a yachtie" but "a seafarer." "I'm not calling you a yachtie, Brian. I would like to be called that, too," Kate told the deckhand. "What do you think I am?"

Brian replied, "Kind of a bitch."

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Kate became visibly upset by Brian's comment and stormed off back to the Valor, even before the van stopped moving.

Brian later clarified his comment on Twitter in response to a preview clip of the episode shared by Below Deck Mediterranean's Captain Sandy Yawn. "No! Not a bitch, said she was acting kinda like a bitch in that moment," he explained. "Poor choice of words though, I know. Sorry! Still love her [to] bits!"

He said in another tweet that he wasn't trying to be hurtful toward Kate. "Didn't mean to hurt Kate's feelings at all," Brian tweeted. "We got along throughout the whole season except for this incident."

Although Brian apologized to Kate in several tweets, he said he doesn't believe the chief stew is innocent in the matter, either. "[I'm] not saying what I said was right but I kept asking her NOT to call me a yachtie yet she kept doing it [despite] what I was asking," he tweeted. "Obviously was trying to get a reaction out of me."

Kate explained during the Below Deck Season 7 After Show (clip above) that she meant "yachtie" as a compliment, describing it as someone who is "well-traveled" and "hardworking," as well as someone who "mixes well with other people" and "somebody you enjoy living in close quarters with that works hard." But Brian did not take it that way. "When you say it a certain way, it's an insult," he said during the After Show. "But I'm here for a career; I'm not here to just get f--king drunk and travel and s--t."

The chief stew expressed that she feels like she's been largely misunderstood this season, especially among the male crew members. "I was not being rude to them. I was actually being nice to them, and even when I was nice to them, they were like, 'bitch.' And I was just like, I didn't know what I was doing wrong," Kate said during the After Show. "It was like the first time of many times that there was this male fraternity on board where all the guys just didn't respect me."

Catch up on this season of Below Deck through the NBC app, and look out for new episodes Mondays at 9/8c.

Relive Kate and Brian's drama, below.

Preview

Did Brian de Saint Pern Just Call Kate Chastain a Bitch?!