Blue Collar Blues

by Rosalyn McMillan

Genres: General Fiction

Synopsis

A brutal struggle for power in the manipulative automobile industry pits white collar against blue collar. Life altering secrets, pride, ambition, & lust drive them to grab what they can from life, before the upheaval promises to change their relationships forever.

Release date: July 9, 1999

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Print pages: 368

Sample

___________

The spring mornings were warming gradually. In mid-April, the sun rose earlier, and the deep cold of the Michigan winter was losing its grip. The warming rain was making mournful music for the mind. A careful ear could almost hear the song of a romantic sonnet by Byron in the steady downpour.

Khan Davis didn’t have such an ear. Her mind concentrated on more mundane thoughts: money and sex.

Parking the car in her usual spot at Champion Motors’ Troy Trim plant, she turned off her headlights and stole a final glance in the lighted mirror. Dabbing her pinkie in her mouth, she smoothed the high arch of her eyebrow, then fingered the right side of her short blond curls so that a few strands would just brush the tips of her half-hooded eyes.

Four feet eleven, with shiny blond hair and caffe latte skin, Khan imagined herself as a miniature Dorothy Dandridge with an attitude readying herself for a rendezvous with Harry Belafonte. But in real life, her appointment this morning was with a more dependable date, a power sewing machine that didn’t give a damn how she looked.

“Damn,” Khan snorted under her breath after grabbing her purse and umbrella. “This stupid weather is going to frizz up my new hairdo before R.C. gets a chance to see it.” Pressing the button to pop open her umbrella, she slammed the car door and sprinted off. Halfway to the employee entrance, she could feel her hair rising like fresh yeast.

Most of the women who worked at Champion waited until they arrived at work before painting their faces in the women’s bathroom, although they knew that makeup didn’t make them more attractive to the males in the plant: Only the digits on their paychecks could do that.

But Khan Davis never went anywhere without looking absolutely perfect. Quite frankly, she loved to show off her petite figure. As she entered the plant each morning, Khan looked fine and dangerous. Dangerous because she already had a man.

Wearing a heavily starched pair of beige Calvin Klein jeans and a matching blouse, her gold chain belt with large loops echoing the eighteen-karat hooped earrings she wore in her ears, Khan naturally swished her hips as she walked to a rhythm from the old South that no one could hear or understand unless they’d been raised there.

The fresh scent of Cool Stream perfume oil mixed with Egyptian Musk brought attention from her male colleagues, whom she could see watching her out of the corner of her eye. Looking good and smelling outrageously different from other women was Khan’s trademark.

Once inside the building, Khan was greeted by the familiar chug-a-lug noise from dozens of forklift drivers on their hi-los hauling stock in and out of the sewing units. The sharp smell of new vinyl mixed with gas fumes from the hi-lo followed, filling every molecule of air. Worse yet, she knew she was inhaling the toxic smell of burning glue coming from the laminator machines.

Reaching inside her purse, Khan removed the safety glasses that everyone was required to wear inside the plant. The titanium lights thirty feet above gave the impression of daylight, but Khan squinted as she waited in line in the break area to purchase the early edition of The Detroit News.

It was four thirty-five in the morning. The second shift of Champion Motors’ Troy Trim Division hourly automobile workers would begin in twenty-five minutes.

The cold, high-glossed cement floor was painted stone gray. Set against the white walls, the lack of color created a stark tone that permeated every aspect of the plant. So no matter how much seniority Khan managed to tuck under her belt, she still felt imprisoned working at Champion—even if Champion was a prison that allowed her to make tons of money and then go home each day. The problem was, she made so much money that she didn’t want to go home. The plant felt like a brick shrine luring its brainwashed devotees; the call of money was irresistible.

“Hot tacos. Hot tacos,” Mexican José shouted as he pimp-walked into the break area. At sixty-two, José had forty-two years’ seniority. He’d been selling tacos before he began his shift for the past thirty years at Champion. Rumor was that his sales totaled over a thousand dollars a week. José was living big. He drove an Incognito, Champion’s most expensive sport luxury car, bought the best clothes, and had the best pussy money could buy. A few employees were jealous of the tax-free money José accumulated each week. But they weren’t envious enough to stop buying his Mexican delights. Nobody made tacos like José’s wife, Marisela.

Khan knew that Marisela rose at two every morning to prepare and wrap over two hundred tacos for her husband. Hours later in the plant, the spicy scent of cumin made even those who weren’t hungry indulge in the hot temptations. Dozens of vending machines filled with hot coffee, cold milk, fruit juices, potato chips, candy, and other snacks were no competition for José’s taco cart.

“How about you, señorita?” José asked in his sexy Mexican drawl. “You want two today?”

This morning Khan was tempted, but she shook her head no as she dropped two quarters into the coffee machine.

She took a seat in the break area across from the Rembrandt Imperial sewing unit she worked in. Located next to the Imperial were the Givenchy and Base Rembrandt units that took up half of the south end of the plant. Rembrandt, the top moneymaking luxury car for Champion for two decades running, was reserved for only the highly skilled sewing machine operators. Khan had begun working the unit after only one year at Champion.

In the five years she’d worked at Champion’s Troy Trim plant, her routine rarely varied. In ten minutes her sewing partner, Luella, would arrive and they would head into the unit together to begin their day’s production.

Several of Khan’s co-workers were watching the early morning news on television sets perched high on pedestals in the break area. Khan wasn’t interested. As she waited for Luella, Khan flipped open Section A of her paper, skimming more than reading. Anything was more interesting than talking to some of the other hourly workers in the plant. Usually their main topic of conversation began and ended with overtime—who got it, who needed it, and who wasn’t getting any.

Sipping on a cup of black coffee, Khan turned to the business section. She began to read an article about how the Japanese were gaining market shares in the automobile industry at a faster rate than the Big Four. Because of the increased sales of utility trucks, the Japanese were implementing an aggressive campaign to capitalize on the high profit margin from these vehicles.

Mmm . . . some competition. That’s something R.C. would be interested in. She missed R.C. Is that why she was reading the business section? To feel connected to him?

Khan checked her Timex, then turned to the metro section and continued reading. This morning, the comics weren’t funny. And she didn’t believe a word of her horoscope: It’s your kind of day. You learn secrets.

“Bullshit.”

Damn, she thought, checking her watch for the third time. It was 4:45 A.M. and still no sign of Luella, who was rarely late. Craning her neck to look down the hall, she saw familiar faces and waved hello to a few. She wanted it to be lunchtime when her shift was over. She was hoping to see R.C., who was due back in town from Japan later this morning. She needed to get home so she could freshen up and then screw his brains out.

Flipping the metro section back to its front page, she read the caption beneath a large picture in the middle of the page. The caption read: ENTREPRENEUR WEDS TOP JAPANESE FASHION MODEL. She stopped. Her heart felt as cold as a corpse. The picture was of R.C. and a woman she’d never seen before. The article read: “Mr. R.C. Richardson, 50, owner of seven Champion dealerships in the tri-county area as well as a world-renowned stud ranch in Paris, Kentucky, wed beautiful Tomiko Johnson, 22, over the weekend in Japan. The couple plan on a short honeymoon at Mr. Richardson’s ranch in Paris, Kentucky. . . .”

It was as if someone had drained all the blood from her body and only the shell remained. She felt numb. Hollow. Yet her brain still functioned and was running full speed. “That lying son of a bitch!” Khan mumbled under her breath. Tears burned in her eyes like hot steam as she began to reread the article.

Khan inspected the photograph, staring at R.C.’s new wife. In the black-and-white photo the woman, who didn’t even look twenty-one years old, appeared to be of Asian and African descent. Her features were Japanese looking, but her skin tone was definitely dark.

What in the hell does she have that I don’t?

Khan wadded the page into a tight ball and tossed it into the trash. R.C. had better hide, she thought, because if I see that bastard I’m going to kill him. No, killing him ain’t good enough. I’m going to tie a rope around his balls, tie it to one of his cars, and drag his whorish ass down the street until he’s covered with blood.

Hell yeah. That’s exactly what I’m going to do. When she threw her cold coffee in the trash, her hands were shaking.

As she walked into her unit, Khan was consumed with thoughts of confronting R.C. Then again, she thought, what would be the point? She’d only lose her pride. At the supervisor’s desk, a new worker was using the interplant phone—a plant no-no. Standing next to her was Valentino, Khan’s first cousin.

Since early February, Valentino had been assigned to work in the Imperial sewing unit because their production volume had increased from two hundred fifty to three hundred fifty a day. Arriving at work an hour earlier than Khan, Valentino’s job was to place by Khan’s machine the “line-up” sheet that indicated the color and fabric (leather or cloth) and quantity of the jobs the unit would be sewing that day.

“I put today’s schedule on your table already,” Valentino said to Khan.

Khan swallowed back her tears and managed a small smile. “Thanks, Tino.” She was amazed by her sudden, cold composure. He stepped beside her as she walked toward the front of the unit where she and Luella sewed the rear seat cushions. She stopped at her sewing table, exhaled, and talked herself into not thinking about R.C. At least not for the next five minutes. When she looked in Tino’s face, she noticed his reddened eyes. “You look tired. How’s Sarah and the baby?”

“Sarah’s the same. But the baby is teething. We barely got any sleep this weekend.”

“Didn’t you work Sunday?”

“Yeah. Twelve hours in Givenchy.”

Valentino was on the A-team, a clique of twelve hourly employees who worked from the front to the back of the unit and brought home anywhere from fifteen hundred to two thousand dollars a week. His job began at 4:00 A.M. chasing stock shortages, communicating schedule adjustments with shop scheduling, making sure that all of his sewers had the correct amount of stock to sew the day’s production, keeping the unit clean, removing excess welt spools, thread spools, and all rubbish.

Before his day ended, Valentino would pack out all finished stock on Cooley carts, which were three-sided double-shelved metal carts that held twelve complete jobs. One job consisted of a rear cushion, rear back, two front cushions, and two front backs. He would then verify the pack-out count, submit the total to the supervisor, and finally roll the cart across the aisle to River Rouge Build.

River Rouge Build was located in the southeast corner of Troy Trim. This operation assembled the cushion covers to the front and rear cushions onto foam rubber pads and steel track frames for three of Champion’s luxury car lines, Rembrandt, Syrinx, and Remington. Once they were put together these items were sent on to River Rouge Assembly to be added to the cars.

Ten years earlier, when several jobs were being sent to Mexico, Champion lost some of their main car lines. But at the same time the River Rouge Assembly Plant, which was a subdivision of Champion, was expanding. Troy Trim was always eager to bid on new jobs for Rouge Assembly. Just this year, Champion had bid on a job to house the very profitable Facial Operations, which consisted of pouring color-keyed plastic into molds that produced the facial bumpers.

As for Valentino, River Rouge proved highly lucrative for him as well.

Because they were freefloating workers, the A-team tended to get most of the overtime. Supposedly, that favoritism had stopped because of the complaints from other employees, but everyone knew that the same group of people were still getting the majority of overtime.

And Champion’s hourly workers lived and fought daily for overtime. But the price was high: it reduced them to beggars. Even though the workers may not need the money, they were as obsessed with getting overtime as an angry drug addict always needing more.

Khan placed her purse beneath her table, unlocked her cabinet, and took out her sewing tools. She looked at Valentino and said, “No wonder you look beat. You’re going to kill yourself working so much overtime.”

It was a shame to see such a pretty man so worn out. Tino was just over six feet tall, with wide-set shoulders and a narrow frame. Most of the women in the plant thought Valentino was beautiful. Especially Luella. Until Valentino matured, Khan had never realized that one man could spend so much time apologizing for being so pretty. Even behind his glasses no one could miss the indecent length of his lashes.

As she focused on her cousin, Khan felt her own hurt over R.C. move out of the way. She and her cousin had always been close. Khan was also close to Valentino’s father, Uncle Ron, who was the union boss at the Troy Trim plant. “Now, show me a picture of that baby. I know you got some new ones.”

Valentino’s face lit up like a river of gold when he flipped out a new photo of Jahvel from his wallet and handed it to Khan.

“Tino, if this boy gets any prettier, I’m personally launching his modeling career.”

Tino flinched. A man didn’t want his son to look pretty. Tino especially hated the idea that his son would inherit his problems. Being a man, and being respected, was more important—especially for a black man.

Two years ago, Valentino had been hooked on the crack pipe. He lost his job at Champion, then was fired from a bussing job at a low-end restaurant. During that trying time, his wife, Sarah, stuck with him. But when Uncle Ron finally kicked them out after Valentino stole money from him, Valentino and Sarah were homeless. Sarah soon found out she was pregnant and moved back in with her parents. They tried to convince her to abort the baby and divorce Tino. Sarah refused, and this proved to be Valentino’s wake-up call. He went through drug rehab and kicked his habit. Sarah stuck it out.

“Sarah wants Jahvel to go to Harvard. Neither of us want him to become the third generation of Lamotts working in a factory.” He smiled at his cousin. From the center aisle, a hi-lo driver blew his horn and signaled for Valentino.

“Hey, it’s time to get to work.”

“Yeah,” Khan mumbled, snatching her thoughts away from R.C., “and my partner’s not here yet.”

Tino slid off the table. “When Luella gets in, tell her I put that stack of white front cushions on her table. I need them repaired as soon as possible. Rouge River’s on my ass.”

It was a typical Monday morning. Tired workers grunted their hellos and good mornings, followed by the angry whirring sound of power sewing machines gearing up. Even the machines had an attitude this morning.

* * *

Fifty-five minutes later, Khan was hunched over her machine, sweating like a mad dog poised for the kill. It had taken her less than an hour to sew up most of her float.

The power of the machine’s humming vibrated from her fingers to the tips of her toes, but it hadn’t done much for the throbbing pain in her head. Where was Luella? It just wasn’t like her to be so late and not even call. Then Khan’s thoughts returned to R.C.

Fuck it. That bastard owes me an explanation.

She reached beneath her table and retrieved her purse in search of change for the telephone. As she did so, she inhaled the unpleasant odor of a man who thought he could camouflage not taking a bath with an overdose of cologne—her supervisor, James Allister. So much for the phone call.

Scratching his head with a pencil, Allister stood by her machine with the time sheet in his hand. “Mornin’, Davis. I need you to pick up two hours of production to cover Luella’s job until she gets in.”

Khan looked at the time sheet and rolled her eyes. Thirty years ago the union and the company had agreed to let each unit monitor the amount of overtime granted to their employees. The rule was that, while one employee might get more overtime than another, no one should ever get more than thirty-two hours ahead of the other people in the unit. Everybody kept an eye on everyone else by watching the postings that the supervisors put up near their desk every Monday. If one worker was posting eight hundred hours and another posted eight hundred and fifty, everyone knew there was a problem.

The thirty-two-hour spread was agreed to because everybody’s job was so different that it was impossible to maintain the overtime spread any closer. The agreement was rarely enforced until the late 1980s, when overtime started becoming scarce. Now, everyone watched the postings like a Budweiser lizard watching a frog. And everyone knew that if they were offered overtime and refused it, the amount of the hours they refused would still be added to their total overtime hours. If someone was twenty-six hours ahead of the others in the unit and was offered six hours of overtime, it would put them at the limit whether they accepted the hours or not.

The cold coins in her hands felt like hot metal against Khan’s sweaty palms. They burned with the fire she felt in her teeth and gut. “Not today, Allister. I’ve got plans this afternoon.” Of course she didn’t tell him that her plans had suddenly changed: instead of spending a romantic day with R.C., all she wanted to do was go home and cry in peace. “Give her a few minutes. I’m sure she’ll be in.”

“Can’t wait. I’ve got Rouge on my back and you’re low on hours. If you don’t want the overtime, I’ll have to charge you.” Allister made no attempt to hide the smirk on his chalk-white face.

Khan turned to see that Chet, who ran the listing and welt-cord machine in front of her, was almost out of work. Luella’s absence was stopping progress.

The scent of Allister’s cheap cologne sickened her and she turned up her nose. “Sorry. Not today,” Khan said, silently cursing Luella under her breath. Khan just couldn’t deal with more hours. She needed some time to herself.

Turning back to her machine, she sewed a few stitches in the plastic cording, then pushed the button for the arm to cut off the excess. Swiveling to her left side, she placed the cypress-cloth cushion and leather facing between the welt cord, then pushed the knee pedal to lift the foot and shoved the stock beneath it. She could feel the thick, smooth texture of the luxury body-cloth against the tips of her fingers as she lockstitched the top, following through to the end of the 5/8-inch sew seam. After clipping the threads, she spot-checked her work, then tossed it on the cart beside her table and noticed that her watch said six A.M. Where the hell was Luella? Khan just couldn’t deal with working overtime today, of all days. She felt like she could barely make it to quitting time.

There were four more cushions left. In two minutes Khan would be out of work. Without Luella moving work down the line, Khan, like Chet, would be cooling her heels.

No such luck. Khan looked up to see Mary Kemper, a sewing operator from the Syrinx unit, sitting down at Luella’s machine. Khan sighed. Mary could sew triple production, but half of it was usually garbage. The quality curve on their line would plummet today. Any other day, Khan would care. But right now, she couldn’t worry about quality. She felt her problems were greater than Champion Motors.

* * *

At that precise moment, Luella was driving like Road Runner passing Wile E. Coyote on her way to work. When Luella had tried to start her car this morning, her DieHard had been as dead as yesterday. She’d waited fifty minutes for a tow truck to give her a jump, and when she finally took off for work, she was furious. At the corner of Big Beaver and Alpine, she was just a mile away from Champion. It was still raining and she was driving too fast. Her bald front tires caught an unexpected puddle and she skidded off the road, losing control. Luella crashed into the pole that supplied electricity to eight city blocks as well as to Champion Motors. The pole went down and the lines were cut, dancing in a crazy spray of deadly white light.

Khan was forcing the last two pieces of rear backs beneath the sewing foot when the foam edges of the stock stuck on the side of the foot. With her left hand holding the stock in place, she yanked the wheel with her right hand, then pressed down on the foot pedal.

Immediately, the plant went on emergency backup power. The system provided electricity for the emergency lights and certain strategic computer systems, but no production operations.

Khan heard the sound of the generator and looked up at the blinking lights. Even without electricity, her powerful sewing machine was still moving from the force of its own momentum, sending size-ten needles piercing through her left middle finger, again and again, making a trail up past her knuckle and stopping at the center of her hand. The coarse green thread felt like a wet whip against her tender skin. Blood began to seep through the stitches, each a sixteenth of an inch apart.

“Ahhh.” Khan sucked in her breath and turned her head away. “Oh Lord, what have I done! Oh my God!” She screamed.

The bluish tinge from her engagement ring was the last sparkle of light she saw before losing consciousness.

Chet hollered for a mechanic. He and Valentino worked for fifteen minutes to dismantle the machine and release her hand.

Still unconscious, Khan was whisked off to William Beaumont Hospital.

* * *

When Khan opened her eyes, it took her a moment to get her bearings. Everything around her was beige. She couldn’t be in the plant. Then she inhaled the sharp smell of disinfectant and, looking around, remembered what had happened. She looked down at her hand, which was covered with blood and throbbing.

She heard the sound of footsteps coming toward her and prayed that it was R.C., that somehow he had heard of her accident and realized the mistake he’d made. Even though she knew this was foolishness, her heart sank when the doctor entered. He mumbled some medical terms to her that she didn’t try to understand. What did it matter? She was injured and in pain. And the man she had loved for five years wouldn’t be there to take her home.

Damn you, R.C.! her mind screamed as she felt a hypodermic needle piercing her skin.

She watched through squinty eyes as the doctor worked on her hand. Since the shot they gave her for pain didn’t work, she felt every one of the thirty stitches he looped through her swollen hand. But that ordeal was nowhere near as intense as the pain in her heart.

The doctor tried to soothe her with comforting words. Still, Khan tuned him out. Her thoughts ran back to the day several years before when her Uncle Ron had told her that R.C. would never marry a factory worker. He had been right.

A spasm of pain seared through her fingers, and Khan winced in agony. By the time the shot finally began to work, the doctor was finished and her hand was bandaged.

* * *

Four hours later, Khan was back at the plant. The doctor in the medical office at Champion provided her with a slip that released her from work for the remainder of the day and put her on temporary disability until she had her stitches taken out. Though she was excused from working, she still had to report back to him on Tuesday.

By 11:40 A.M., Khan had parked her car at the Virginia Park Townhouses—home. It was nearly fifty-seven degrees and the sun was just coming out. A small wind lifted the budding branches in the front of her condominium complex, then let them fall again. The warm breeze carried the scent of spring as she placed her key in the lock and opened the door.

Once inside her compact condo, she was greeted by the sensual fragrance of French mulberry displayed in decorative wrought-iron pedestal bowls.

Wincing at the pain in her hand as she hung up her coat, the anger she had felt earlier flushed through her again like the hot flash of a woman going through menopause. She felt confused. Exactly how, she wondered, was she supposed to feel?

Disgusted with herself, she clicked on the television set and turned to BET, Black Entertainment Television. The top ten videos were on. Maybe that would change her mood.

“Ha! Ha!” the choir said.

I don’t see a damn thing that’s funny, Khan thought as she shed her work clothes and slipped on a pair of diamond-patterned silver and pink cotton pajamas.

“Put your hands together,” she heard the choir shouting from the television at the opposite end of her apartment. They were stomping on the devil. In her mind, she envisioned R.C. Her knee twitched in anticipation. Hell, she thought. I can do better than that.

Khan tried not to look at the picture of R.C. on her dresser. The harder she tried not to look, the more it kept drawing her eyes like a magnet. Yet she couldn’t put it away—not yet.

She snatched off her engagement ring, which the doctor had thoughtfully switched to her right hand, placing it in the top drawer of her dresser along with all the expensive jewelry R.C. had given her. All of it glittered and gleamed and looked as vulgar as she felt.

The photo of R.C. and his bride flashed through her mind. She removed the heavy antique silver locket from around her neck. Inside was a picture she and R.C. had taken when they were in Las Vegas.

Khan picked up the phone and dialed his home to see if his flight from Japan had arrived. She knew he was scheduled to land at 9 A.M. His maid, Bonnie, recognized Khan’s voice the second she grumbled hello.

“Mr. Richardson isn’t here, Ms. Khan,” said Bonnie.

“When do you expect him?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

Of course Bonnie knew exactly where the bride and groom were. And of course she wouldn’t tell Khan. Things were going to get ugly and there was no way of avoiding it.

“Tell him I called.” She spoke between clenched teeth. “And Bonnie, I suggest you pull R.C.’s coattails to the side and whisper in his ear that if he doesn’t call me today, I’ll be on his doorstep tomorrow to kick his rusty black ass.” And that half-breed he married instead of me.

Tears welled in her eyes as she hung up. “Ha. Ha. The joke’s on me.”

Her stomach grumbled and ached when she went into the bathroom to grab some tissue. Whatever pain medication they’d given her made her tongue feel thick and dry. Just then, the telephone rang.

“Hello,” Khan said hesitantly, praying that it was R.C.

It was Thyme.

“Hey, girl. I heard about your accident this morning. How’s my little friend faring?”

Khan felt her shoulders sinking. “Oh, okay I guess.” She wiped her eyes with the tissue but the tears kept falling.

“Stomp! Stomp!” the choir said louder. “Church, are you with me? Put your hands together.”

Khan punched the remote and turned off the television set. She’d had enough of feeling ridiculed. Especially by a group of folks who didn’t even know her.

“Hey,” Thyme said, “you sound funny.”

“It’s the medication,” Khan lied. She inhaled and pulled herself together. “Have you heard anything about Luella? Allister told me while I was in the medical office that she was in a car accident.”

Thyme laughed. “The pole she hit is in worse shape than she is. It took Detroit Edison nearly four hours to get the lights back on inside the plant. We were just about to send everyone home.”

“I can imagine what all those folks were doing up there in the dark.” Khan managed to laugh. “Screwing like gerbils.”

“Be nice now, girl. Everyone’s back to work. Even Luella.”

“Great. Now Allister’s probably having her do my job as well as hers. And he’ll still probably charge me four hours today,” Khan huffed. “Maybe if I bought that stinking bastard a bottle of Cool Water cologne he might get the point. Then again, he might try to fire my broke ass.”

“Loosen up, Khan. Get some rest, and I’ll be over as soon as I can. Need anything?”

“I hate to ask, but do you mind stopping at the Somerset Collection to pick me up a half-pound of Mrs. Fields oatmeal-and-raisin cookies?”

“You hate to ask? Girl, when are you going to grow up? You’re just like a little kid. Just tell me what you need—I’m your friend.”

Khan felt a tear touch her smile, and tucked her pajamaed legs beneath her. Never, she thought, I’m never going to grow up. That’s what R.C. loved about me.

__________

Thyme Tyler unlocked her desk drawer and removed the FedEx envelope. The name and address of the sender had been omitted. For at least a month she’d been waiting for this information. She could feel the perspiration itching on the tips of her fingers as she ripped open the top and removed the contents.

Inside was a list of people who worked