First Pedicure
Right now I’m sitting on the throne.
I’m the only client here, a man, facing a line
of Asian and Hispanic women of various ages
staring at me from across the salon.
They look at me. I look at them. They look
at me more; I do the same. Eventually
we all look away. One Latina comes forward
to begin my care. The rest have gone back
to looking at their phones. She removes my shoes,
socks, places my feet in a jet bath below me.
She miles at me, I smile at her. There’s
no small talk or conversation. Dressed
in a smock, her hair in a bun, she does
her job: my toe nails clipped, dead skin cleared,
cleansed with lotions, jet-bathed again, heel
and underfoot pumiced, perfumed
like an Egyptian King. In the half hour
more clients have come in, most for manicures.
A black man in a jogging suit, chatting on
his cell, sits two seats away. Two attendants
rush over to serve him, both hands and feet.
I pay, tip, leave thinking he must be
some kind of god.