The pedicure chair that made me quit

I had only worked at the salon for three weeks when two customers almost started fighting over a pedicure chair.

At first, I thought they were joking.

Then one of them stood up barefoot with wet polish on her toes and told the other woman to meet her outside.

That was the moment I knew I was not coming back.

My name is Candy, and that salon in Torrance was my first real job in the nail business.

I had finished beauty school not long before that. I was still nervous about everything.

I worried about cutting someone, choosing the wrong polish, taking too long, or making a customer unhappy.

The owner told me the salon was usually calm. She said the customers were friendly and the workers helped each other.

For the first two weeks, that seemed true.

Most customers were patient with me because I was new. A few even told me I was doing a good job.

Then Saturday came.

The salon was completely packed.

Every pedicure chair was full. People were waiting near the front desk, children were walking around, and three phones seemed to be ringing at the same time.

One customer had an appointment at 2:00. I will call her Lisa.

Lisa came in about fifteen minutes late.

The receptionist told her we would still take her, but she might have to wait because another customer had already been seated.

That customer was a woman named Renee.

Renee did not have an appointment, but she had arrived early and had already been waiting for almost forty minutes.

The receptionist put Renee in the next available pedicure chair.

That should have been the end of it.

But Lisa walked over and told Renee that the chair belonged to her because she had an appointment.

Renee said she had already waited long enough and was not moving.

Lisa went back to the front and started complaining.

The receptionist tried to explain that appointments were not guaranteed when someone arrived late, especially on a busy Saturday.

Lisa did not like that answer.

She said she had been coming to the salon for years and should not be treated like a walk-in.

The owner was busy doing nails and kept telling everyone to calm down.

Meanwhile, I was assigned to do Renee’s pedicure.

I filled the tub, helped her choose a color, and tried to act like nothing was happening.

But Lisa kept standing near us.

She would not sit in the waiting area. She stood right beside the chair and watched me work.

Renee finally asked her to stop staring.

Lisa said she was not staring. She said she was waiting for her chair.

Renee laughed and told her it was not her chair anymore.

That little laugh changed everything.

Lisa started saying Renee had no class.

Renee told Lisa she was acting crazy over a pedicure.

The whole salon became quiet.

Even the customers who had been talking stopped.

I looked at the owner, expecting her to come over and handle it.

She stayed at her table and told the receptionist to deal with them.

The receptionist was only nineteen years old.

She looked more scared than I was.

She asked Lisa to wait outside for a few minutes.

Lisa refused.

Then Renee told her she should leave before she embarrassed herself even more.

Lisa walked closer to the chair.

Renee sat up straight.

I was still holding one of Renee’s feet over the water.

I did not know whether to put it down or keep working.

Lisa pointed at Renee and said she was lucky they were inside a business.

Renee pulled her foot away from me, stood up, and stepped onto the floor.

Her toes were separated with foam spacers, and the polish was still wet.

She told Lisa they could go outside right now.

For one second, nobody moved.

Then Lisa grabbed Renee’s purse from the empty chair beside her and dropped it on the floor.

Renee pushed the pedicure tray away so hard that bottles rolled across the floor.

One bottle of red polish broke near my shoes.

I jumped back.

Renee moved toward Lisa, and Lisa raised both hands.

I honestly thought they were about to start hitting each other.

The receptionist screamed for the owner.

Two other customers stood up and backed away.

One nail tech grabbed Renee by the arm. Another worker stepped between Lisa and the door.

The owner finally came over.

Instead of separating the customers right away, she started asking who had touched the purse.

That made both women yell even louder.

Renee said she wanted the police called.

Lisa said she was the one being threatened.

They were both talking over each other, and the owner kept saying she did not want trouble in her salon.

I was standing near the broken polish with my hands shaking.

I had never seen grown women get that angry over a chair.

Then the strangest part happened.

A regular customer walked out of the bathroom, looked at Lisa, and called her by name.

It turned out they knew each other.

The regular customer was Lisa’s sister-in-law.

She asked Lisa what she was doing there because Lisa had told the family she was sick and could not attend her niece’s birthday party that afternoon.

The salon went silent again.

Lisa’s face changed immediately.

She forgot all about Renee.

She started asking her sister-in-law not to say anything to the family.

Renee looked at me and started laughing.

She sat back in the chair like the fight had never happened.

Lisa grabbed her purse and rushed out of the salon.

Her sister-in-law followed her outside while talking on the phone.

A few minutes later, Renee asked me to finish her pedicure.

I was shocked.

Her foot was still wet, one toe had red polish smeared across it, and she was acting completely normal.

The owner told me to clean the broken bottle first and then continue the service.

I finished the pedicure, but my hands would not stop shaking.

Renee complained that one toenail looked uneven.

She asked for a discount because the argument had ruined her relaxing experience.

The owner gave her ten dollars off.

Nobody asked whether I was okay.

At closing time, I cleaned the polish off the floor and wiped down the chair.

The receptionist told me things like that did not happen often.

Then she admitted that two customers had thrown drinks at each other the month before.

That night, I went home and told myself I was overreacting.

I needed the job. I had just started. I did not want people to think I was weak.

But the next morning, I sat in my car outside the salon for almost twenty minutes.

Every time I looked at the front door, I remembered Renee standing up barefoot and Lisa throwing her purse.

I kept thinking about how the owner stayed at her table while a nineteen-year-old receptionist tried to stop the fight.

I finally called the owner and told her I was quitting.

She said I needed to give two weeks’ notice.

I told her I had only worked there for three weeks, and I was already scared to walk inside.

She said I would never survive in the nail business if one difficult Saturday made me quit.

Maybe she was right about that salon.

But I found another salon two months later, and I stayed there for almost four years.

Customers complained there too. People got upset. Sometimes voices were raised.

But nobody ever asked me to keep doing a pedicure while two women prepared to fight beside my chair.

The last thing I heard about the Torrance salon was that Lisa came back the following week.

She wanted the owner to explain to her family that she had only stopped by to buy a gift card.

The owner agreed to help her.

I guess keeping one regular customer was more important than telling the truth.

That made me even happier I had quit.