My book says that-
In acidic water, the negative fatty acid ions become fatty acids.
However, they did not include a chemical equation to demonstrate this, so I made my own:
$$\ce{C17H35COO- (aq) + HCl (aq) -> C17H35COOH (aq) + Cl- (aq)}$$
But according to this equation, the fatty acid ion is a base, since it gets a proton. So this must be wrong. Can anyone point out my mistakes (if any), and explain what happens when a negative fatty acid ion comes in contact with acidic water, and becomes a fatty acid?