"You can put the buzzer away.  I know who you are.  If ya think I'm taking the rap for this, you're just whacky."

The cop pocketed his badge and motioned to the nearby park bench.  Abby sat down with a sigh and began to explain. 

"First off,"  She held up a finger enumerating her points.  "... it wasn't my fault.  The floor was like three inches of oil already.  Your feet were always sticking to it.  Anyone can tell ya.  Even trying to clean that thing was a trip for biscuits."  

Her second finger went up, "Secondly, you're a smart fella.  Did ya count the number of doors and windows?  How much air do ya really think gets into a place like that, eh?"  

Abby tried to play it cool, tucking a small bit of her dark hair back under the kerchief she wore atop her head. "That wet sock of a supervisor and his golddigger secretary, we'd complained to them all the time.  Told 'em the place was a damn death trap.  Did they listen?  No.  They had cotton in their ears so long as the sawbucks kept coming in."

The cop offered her a cigarette from the crumpled pack he had in his shirt pocket.  She took one with a still trembling hand.  He lit it for her and she took a long pull before saying, "Thanks."

As he tucked the zippo back into his pocket he addressed her gently, "Why don't you start from the beginning?"

Abby scoffed and a cloud of smoke billowed out of her red-painted lips.  "What do you think I'm gonna say that'll change shit?  Two men just went off in a meat wagon crispier than my grandma's Sunday fried chicken, and Ol' Tom's probably close behind 'em.  Ain't no one doin' nothing bout this sorta thing.  At least not for now, not with things the way things they are. Folks are so hard up for work they'll be lined up around the block to work here when they reopen in a few weeks.  Don't matter how many people die here."

"Ms. Whitehill it's easy to see how someone could be jaded by the working conditions and how hard getting by is for folks these days, but if you were refusing to tell me about how the fire in this factory started for some other reason..."

Abby's eyes darted away from the cop and she shook her head emphatically, "No.  Ain't no reason other than I'm just sick and tired of being..."  Poor?  A victim?  A nobody?  "... sick and tired."  

Abby stood up abruptly and could feel the weight of the phone number in her pocket.  She meant to throw it out.  She told herself it didn't matter how nice of a dress that dame Morticia wore ... or what Melissa was offering, working for a gangster like Mist_and_Shadows was flat out brodie.  She weren't no criminal.  But with the smoke from the still burning factory stinging her eyes, and the smell of charred flesh in her nose; she wasn't sure she had much in the way of choices.  It would be weeks before the factory was open again and even once it did reopen, and it would, she didn't think she could force herself to walk back through the doors no matter how hungry she got.

"Well, if you think of anything else..."

Pulling off her kerchief she wiped her face with it.  "Yeah."  She scoffed, stuffing the kerchief the pocket of her jumpsuit and pulling out Melissa's phone number.  "Don't hold your breath, eh Copper?"

"Ms. Whitehill?"  The officer called after her three times, but Abby didn't look back.  The choice was made, all she had to do was find a phone to make the call.  She was going to become an associate of Aloha Conservation Inc. or die trying.