"No. Not great," Natasha agreed. Hindsight was 20/20 and all, but still, she was supposed to be the one who considered all the angles. She was supposed to be the one with foresight, and it should have occurred to her exactly how bad bad could be. She should have given Clint a heads up, even if the details weren't entirely hers, and the fact that he was rolling with it so gracefully now anyway, when he didn't have to be so graceful - it said everything, and it meant more than that. "I'm sorry, Clint. I should've..." She shook her head at herself, a sharp little pull it together, Natalia gesture and in a tone left over from the Red Room that she very much wished she could have excised out of herself by the time she was 37 years old. Not the time she should be getting sharpish with herself, but it helped, sometimes. Even when she didn't want it to be a thing that helped, it did. "I'll go. Best not to let him linger."
For a minute, she debated asking him to come, too, but - it might be overwhelming, too much. Better to get James out and move him into the company of the pair of them, quickly. She pressed her lips together, just for a second, lifted her own hands. Her ASL wasn't perfect; she'd only known a little to begin with, a few very basic phrases, and so far she and Clint had spent their time on other errands besides teaching her after she'd asked, but this, she could do: a very careful thank you - unpracticed, not as quickly as she was sure he could do it. She wanted him to know the sincerity in it, though.
When she found her way to the bathroom, following the sound of the running water, she left the door open so it wouldn't feel like so much of a separation, and she rapped her knuckles against the wall as she came in, alerting James to her presence. God, he was motionless under the water, as though he hadn't lifted so much as a bar of soap since she'd directed him in. "Sit, please, so I can help," she said, falling into Russian without thinking too much about it. It was - comfortable, and comforting, a little, at the same time. "Let's get you cleaned up and out of here. Can't leave Clint on his own too long." She reached for the shampoo - not clinical movements, exactly, but efficient, not as though she was being overly coddling about it.
There were times when a person would want to be coddled and doted on, and there were times when a person just needed someone else to help them accomplish a task that felt herculean, and there was no mistaking that this was not a time for coddling. This was about showing up for him in a different kind of way, and Natasha could navigate that much. This was misery, and Natasha knew how to look things in the eye and not flinch in the face of truth. She should have checked in before now. She should have known, but there was no point in two people ripping themselves up right now. And she talked quietly, through it, step by step, nothing unexpected. "Close your eyes for a second so we can rinse - good. Thank you. Want the towel now?"