Not Going To Hand Over An Apology

(I work at a supermarket that only offers organic products. We have regular automatic sliding doors. I am ringing up customers when I hear someone entering, and immediately after this a child, maybe around two years old, starts to cry. I turned to see what’s wrong as a woman dashes into the store, holding her crying child and giving me a death glare. Even before I can even ask what happened, she starts yelling at me.)

Woman: “My son’s hand got stuck in that stupid door!”

Me: “Well, that’s unfortunate. Will he be all right?”

Woman: “Of course not! I bet it’s going to swell!”

(I already am puzzled at how it would be humanly possible to get your hand into that tiny slit at the side of the door, but I know that she is going to blame me for whatever happened. I apologetically look at the customer I was ringing up.)

Me: “Would you excuse me for a second? I need to get something to cool his hand.”

(Luckily, they are very understanding and I hastily get up, leaving the already insane amount of customers in the line to wait. Luckily, a coworker hears me talking and goes to get a cool pack before I can. I get back to what I was doing before, to see that this woman has already snatched a popsicle out of the freezer next to the registers to cool the kid’s hand. He seems to be better now; he’s stopped crying, and looks around as my coworker hands them the cool pack.)

Woman: “That was about time!”

(She then snatched it out of my coworker’s hand but continued to cool her son’s hand with the popsicle. My coworker gave me an annoyed look. Just a few minutes later the woman rushed out of the store and I saw her son eating the popsicle; she never paid for it. A few days later the same coworker told me that she came back the day after to complain about me to our manager. I “never apologized” to her and acted completely rude. What should I have apologized for? For her not telling her kid to not stick his hands everywhere they fit? Luckily our manager took my side and I never saw her again.)