If one couldn’t tell by the pounds of makeup I cake on my face every weekend, the bouncy curls in my hair every day, and the smell of sweets and flowers as I walk by, I’m obsessed with all beauty-related ideas. Hence I worked at a beauty store. One of the most popular globally actually. Sephora.
I think almost every person who’s passionate about some form of beauty dreams of working in a store like Sephora or Ulta, or even some sort of hair or makeup salon. However, behind the cakey makeup, flat hair, and perfumes wearing off are beauty workers like me with sides to them that are not so beautiful.
On my first day of work, I was greeted by who I thought was the manager. She was really the cake boss. I called her that because outside of working at Sephora, she baked tediously detailed designed cakes for a living. Very different from the makeup game.
The cake boss was stern and firm. It was pretty intimidating. Every customer came up to her with their questions about a makeup product, hair tool, or face wash. Sometimes, they even had questions about cakes and baking. And every single time, she delivered a clear crisp answer with the utmost confidence. I couldn’t help but envy her delivery because that was exactly how I wanted to be, even outside of Sephora.
Despite being the boss of cakes and seeming like the boss of Sephora, the cake boss was not the most reliable. She was constantly out of focus, lying on the floor taking medicine, or standing at the register like a bird overlooking its nest.
She seemed to lack motivation. Maybe it was because she was a cake boss rather than the boss of her own company at her age. Eventually, she was fired for missing a record-breaking amount of days of work. Leaving behind a trail of foundation that was as pale as vanilla frosting and cake crumbs.
Our other coworker picked up after the cake boss’ slack and the damage she left behind. I called her the eagle. Mainly because she was Albanian but also because of the way she overlooked and flew over the whole store like an overbearing eagle.
Once I began working at Sephora a little longer, I realized how the Eagle was trying to be the boss. Trying a little too hard to the point where she micromanaged and manipulated her way to the top.
There was one October month in particular when we workers didn’t receive our free training products for the month. The Eagle and I went to the stock room to refill the Sephora floor with new products. While we were back there, there was an empty box that read “October Training Products.” We looked at each other in shock and grew suspicious towards our main bosses.
With her manipulation tactics in mind and her hunger to be in charge, she ordered me to take the empty box out to the Sephora floor to show the coworkers. However, there would be no point to this afterward. If the main bosses were to see this suspicious empty box that was unreasonably brought out by me, who would be to blame?
Despite her best efforts to become boss unscathed, she would remain at the bottom of the Sephora list like the used lipsticks returned to us by customers and talked about by all our coworkers for her obvious ways.
My favorite worker when I left was Harley Quinn. I called him Quinn because his new hair colors every week always reminded me of the character in a good way. At first, I was not fond of him at all. He seemed to look at me with judgment at first. I eventually realized that was how he was and I became fond of the looks he gave customers. They always made me laugh.
But beyond his big dough brown eyes was a long sword of black winged eyeliner. A sword he was ready to fight with and also hide his insecurities behind.
The least memorable workers were whom I called Ramona and Beesuz. They weren’t sisters but they seemed like it by the way their brains calculated and functioned. The most beautiful workers at the Sephora. However, their long shiny hair and poreless glowing skin seemed to mask their lack of confrontation skills and work skills I eventually realized they tried to cover up with shame, a little concealer, and mascara.
Then there was me. By the time I finished Sephora, I was on top. I seemed like the head boss every turned to for questions, who knew the answer to everything, and watched over her beauty products and customers with confidence and care. I felt like the cake boss being in such a position of what felt like power.
However, my reign would come to a fall. The power took over and whisked my head until it started spinning too fast. I would leave Sephora and eventually become the cake boss.
However, I wasn’t making the cakes. I was home eating them while black mascara ran down my vanilla-frosted face.
