"You think these two things are comparable?" Natasha shrieked, her nostrils flaring with anger and mouth pulled taut in something close to a snarl. "That was between me and him, that had nothing to do with you! If you remember correctly, the fact that it had nothing to do with you was what pissed you off in the first place, oh, Natasha, I have money, if you were in trouble, baby, why didn't you come to me to make it all better?" Something merciless and mocking had slipped into her voice, a note that she knew was unfair. Terribly unfair. The concern in him when she'd gone to his house had been palpable.
It had meant something. It had touched her even if they'd papered over it and made a show of putting the usual safeguards of irreverence in place, but it had been there, she'd seen it and returned it and he'd known it. Even if they didn't talk about it. It was enough that it had existed, and that was a shitty thing to use against him, it was a hit below the belt. The metaphorical belt, anyway, considering that she'd chucked the shampoo bottle at him in a decidedly more literal interpretation.
But she was too incensed now and worse, she'd given herself over to that anger entirely, mired herself in a headspace that meant nothing was too terrible to say as long as it scored her points. She could pinpoint someone's weakness at ten miles off, and if she knew someone well enough - well, Clint could certainly attest to the fact that Natasha was not a woman who fought clean. There were no failsafes in place, not once the switch had been flipped, no quiet voice inside her saying pull it back, you'll regret saying that, don't do anything you can't walk back.
Tony, at least, fought back, as her now shattered plates could testify. Tony at least would defend himself, even if it just stoked the fire hotter.
She snatched a champagne glass from one of the place settings, threw it high into the wall where it exploded in a shower of crystal. She hardly ever used these settings anyway, so what did it matter, most of what ended up in this house had been chosen for her. A champagne glass, her plates, the map, what did it matter. "You trusted me to, what, keep myself pristine and perfect for you and not go live my own life?" she shouted, a soup tureen clattering to the ground, and the words came spilling out of her the same way the gazpacho in the tureen spilled along the table as she pushed it over. "Barnes never fucked me and everybody in the goddamn Capitol seemed to figure it out faster than you, he was protecting me! Don't you tell me that I don't know how to handle my own shit!"