Just a wee scéal for the Gremlin (and anyone else who wants to read it) - MM
She was a smart old gal; I'll give her that. She wasn't exactly educated. Well-read maybe. But she was street smart, and world smart.
Coming to America had been her parents' idea. She was, as she put it, just a 'wee thing' when they came here. She'd have rather stayed in Ireland. People there were, as she often said, less full of shit.
When we met, I'd been spending a lot of time hiding from the world in a neat little space at the top of a bridge embankment. There were times I'd stay the night there when things got too bad at home. I'd sit there, smoking, and watch the town where I lived try to live up to its old reputation. It was like a forgotten, deposed monarch living in a shabby excuse for a run-down castle.
I'd look at the lights of town, knowing full well what was going on. I'd look at the hillside across the river. Some nights crosses would be burning, some nights not. It was like a warning to those on our side of the river. We understood it.
Aggie O'Toole had no time or patience for such matters. If I'd tell her a story about something - anything - if I added "and that's the truth!", she'd explain, in her exhausted impatience, that no - it wasn't the truth. Just my take on it. It was my perspective, my point of view.
"It's how a little gobshite like you sees the world, because you haven't seen much. Yet." Then she'd give me a look. It was a knowing look, and it was filled with the type of love you receive from a grandmother. They know you're full of shit, but they love you anyway. They want you to succeed, but they're smart enough to know that the jury is still out on whether or not you will.
How Aggie O'Toole ended up in a washed-up old mill town, run by aging mobsters, will remain a mystery. She never gave the details, and I never asked. All I know is she'd come to America a lifetime ago. New York City. Ellis Island. Lean years. Trouble and strife and building, with her parents, a new life she never wanted. Her parents both drank, as did she. There had been a Mr. O'Toole somewhere along the way, but he was little more than an uncomfortable memory now. On rare occasions, if she was really perturbed or maybe just half-drunk, she'd mention him in less-than-kind terms.
"Don't be stupid, boy! You're sounding like my Brody!"
I knew better than to ask for clarification.
Aggie O'Toole worked somewhere doing something. She was poor, that much was clear. She looked to be barely a step ahead of being what we used to call a bag lady. She drove a giant old, rusted land yacht. An old Catalina, whose better days were beyond memory. She loved cats. The dash of her car was littered with tins of cat food and kitty treats - but I don't know if she personally had a cat. I don't know if she lived in a house or an apartment. There's so much about her I never knew. But she was wise. That much I know.
I used to hitch rides to get around. That was pretty common back then. That's how we met. She stopped to give me a lift - and she harangued me, in her own sweet way, for being too lazy to walk anywhere. She was the reigning queen of "Back in my day" stories.
I'd see her in town. She'd wave if she saw me. My friends would ask how I knew "that crazy old broad". I always paid attention to my surroundings. If I'd run into her in the coffee shop, I noticed the old mobsters showed her respect. They didn't bow before her or anything. If anything, they'd give her some good-natured ribbing, which was usually met with a harsh "mind yer tongue ya greasy blaggard". They recognized her tone and reacted accordingly. Sometimes a laugh, sometimes a serious silence. They clearly knew something most of us didn't.
Aggie O'Toole would take her place at the counter and have a cup of coffee and a pastry. After a while, you could often find me sitting with her, learning the life lessons she had to offer. I often thought she would've talked to anyone. She seemed lonely but not lonesome. Most of the town knew her - but they didn't really know what to do with her.
That's probably why we got on. Neither of us fit in, nor did we want to. Life had put us in this despicable shithole of a town and neither of us had it in us to escape.
I won't exactly say we were 'friends' but Aggie O'Toole and I shared something. If she saw me walking somewhere, she'd offer a ride.
"Your thumb broken, boy?" she'd ask, in her wheezy old brogue. She was becoming my own personal limo service. If she'd ask about my day, which she only seemed to do when she could tell something was on my mind, I'd try my best to sound street smart. She could see right through that every time.
"Dumber'n Brody you are." She always sounded exasperated when she'd say that.
Over the years, she'd occasionally ask about my family. She knew the local gossip better than most. I always tried to hold those particular cards close, but she always seemed to know more than she let on.
Sometimes she'd pick me up and we'd just go riding. One night she drove me up past the bridge.
I hadn’t asked her to. I’d just mentioned the crosses burning again across the river. I said it the way young men say things - with a kind of certainty that only comes from knowing almost nothing.
“Those bastards are trying to send a message.”
Aggie snorted.
“Everything’s a message to boys your age.”
She drove in silence for a while, the big Catalina wheezing along the dark road like an old asthmatic horse.
“You think that’s about you?” she said finally.
“Well...yeah. Us. The town.”
She shook her head.
“Perspective.”
She said the word like it tasted bad.
We crossed the river and climbed the narrow road that led toward the hillside. Little more there than a couple of farms and fields. I started to get nervous. Nobody from our side of the river went up there after dark.
“You trying to get us killed?” I asked, trying to sound like a wiseguy.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” she replied.
When we crested the hill, the cross was already burning. Tall. Bright. Stupid looking.
Aggie pulled the Catalina onto the shoulder and killed the engine.
A few men stood around it. Not robed. Not chanting. Just talking and drinking beer.
I recognized two of them.
One owned the hardware store.
Another was a local cop.
Aggie leaned forward and squinted through the windshield.
“Eejits,” she muttered.
I didn’t understand.
She pointed with her cigarette.
“You see them boys?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s not hatred. That’s boredom.”
I looked again. She was right.
They weren’t watching the cross.
They were arguing about football.
One of them tossed an empty bottle into the weeds.
Another laughed.
“Truth,” Aggie said quietly, “is rarely as dramatic as the story people tell themselves.”
She started the engine again.
“Now sit back before one of those gobshites recognizes my car.”
We drove away.
Neither of us spoke for a long time.
Finally, she said:
“Remember this, boy. Most monsters are just stupid men with nothing better to do.”
We never talked about the ride, or burning crosses again. Truth be told, I don't really remember seeing anymore cross burnings after that.
For the next two years, I'd see Aggie O'Toole around town same as always. Small towns are predictable, if nothing else. One day I stopped in the coffee shop. One of the waitresses asked if I heard about Aggie. She was in the hospital. I must have signaled my worry, because one of the old mobsters offered to have one of his guys drive me to go see her. I thanked him and said I could manage. You never wanted to owe a favor to those guys. Everyone in town knew that.
The hospital smelled like piss, bleach, boiled cabbage and disinfectant.
Aggie O’Toole looked like hell.
She was propped up in a narrow bed with an oxygen tube under her nose and a blanket pulled up to her chest. Her hair stuck out in every direction like she'd been electrocuted.
When she saw me standing in the doorway she squinted.
“Jesus Mary and Joseph,” she wheezed. “Did they start letting stray dogs wander the halls now?”
I stepped inside.
“You look worse than usual,” I said, trying to give as good as I was getting.
“Pneumonia,” she said. “Apparently the lungs object to freezing half to death in a car older than the Pope.”
She coughed, a deep rattling sound that made the oxygen tube twitch.
I shifted my weight, suddenly unsure why I'd come. Teenagers aren't built for hospitals. Everything in the room felt too quiet and too serious.
Aggie watched me fidget.
“Relax, boy,” she said. “I’m not dead yet.”
“Didn’t say you were.”
“Your face did.”
She reached for the plastic cup on the table and took a sip of water. Her hand trembled slightly.
“So,” she said. “What trouble have you gotten yourself into this week?”
“Nothing much.”
She stared at me.
“That means something.”
I shrugged.
“Just the same old shit. School sucks.”
“School,” she said, as if tasting something sour. “A fine place to learn things you'll never use.”
I pulled a chair closer to the bed and sat down.
For a while we didn't say anything.
The oxygen machine hummed softly.
Finally, she said, “You still hiding on that hill like a miserable little gargoyle?”
“Sometimes.”
She nodded.
“Good thinking.”
I looked at her.
“What do you mean?”
“Best place to watch a town,” she said. “Distance gives a body perspective.”
She smiled slightly.
“Not truth, mind you. But closer than most people ever get.”
A nurse passed by the doorway and glanced in.
Aggie lowered her voice.
“Listen to me, boy.”
I leaned forward.
“You ever get the chance to leave this miserable town...”
She paused to cough again.
“...take it.”
“Where would I go?”
She shrugged weakly.
“Anywhere that doesn't already know your name.”
I thought about that.
She studied my face for a moment like she was trying to memorize something. Then the old irritation returned.
“Christ, don’t look so serious,” she said. “You'd think I was giving a sermon.”
“That'd be a first.” I was trying to be comical and cheer her up.
She snorted.
“If I was giving a sermon, you'd already be asleep.”
I stood up after a while, unsure what else to do.
“Alright,” I said. “I’ll let you get some rest.”
She waved a thin hand dismissively.
“Go on then. And try not to do anything stupid on the way home.”
I stepped into the hallway.
Just before I reached the door she called out behind me.
“Boy.”
I turned.
“If anyone ever tells you they know the truth about something...”
She tapped her temple.
“...remember what I told you.”
“Perspective,” I said.
She nodded.
“Good lad.”
Aggie O'Toole was back to her old routine soon enough. The doctors said she had to quit smoking, but she didn't. She said the doc was a quack and an old geebag and she'd quit when and if she wanted to. She looked more like her old self, but she coughed a lot more now.
Not long after I graduated, I left town. I was happy to put it behind me. There was no going away party. No long, drawn-out goodbyes. I just packed a bag and left. I was ready to get to someplace where they didn't already know my name.
***
It's been years since I've been back to the old town. The letter arrived on a Tuesday.
It had the name of a law office printed neatly in the corner of the envelope. For a moment I assumed it was some kind of mistake. People like me don't usually receive letters from attorneys unless something has gone terribly wrong.
Inside was a short note asking me to contact the office regarding the estate of Agnes O'Toole.
It took me a moment to realize who they meant.
Aggie.
I called the number that afternoon.
The attorney sounded young. Too young to be handling the affairs of someone like Aggie O'Toole. He spoke carefully, like a man explaining something unusual.
Ms. O'Toole had passed away several months earlier.
Apparently, she had left instructions that I be contacted.
That was surprising enough.
What came next was even stranger.
Aggie O'Toole had left me a modest sum of money.
Nothing life changing. But enough to make a young man sit quietly for a while and wonder how a half-drunk old woman in a rusted Catalina had managed to leave anything to anyone.
The lawyer cleared his throat.
"There was also a letter," he said.
It arrived a few days later.
The handwriting on the envelope was unmistakable. Crooked and stubborn, like the woman herself.
Inside was a single sheet of paper.
The note was short.
Of course it was.
Aggie O'Toole never wasted words.
Boy,
If you're reading this it means I finally ran out of arguments with the doctors. Don't get sentimental about it. I wasn't planning on living forever. You're probably wondering why I left you anything. It's simple enough. You listened. Most people don't. They talk. They shout. They decide they already know the truth about things. You at least had the good sense to doubt yourself once in a while. That's rarer than you'd think. There's not enough money in the envelope to make you rich, but there's enough to get you moving if you ever feel stuck.
And you already left this miserable town like I told you to. Good. Don't go back unless you absolutely have to. The world is a big place and most of it doesn't care who you used to be.
That's a fine thing. One last bit of advice. Any time someone tells you they know the truth about something...remember what I told you. It's probably just their perspective. Try to see a little further than that. Now stop standing around reading letters from dead women and go do something useful with your life.
- Aggie
I read the letter twice.
Then I folded it back into the envelope and sat there for a long time.
Aggie O'Toole had been right about most things.
Distance does give a body perspective.
Years later I can still picture that night on the hillside. The cross burning. The men arguing about football. And Aggie, behind the wheel of that wheezing old Catalina, knowing the difference between perspective and the truth better than anyone I have ever known.
(© 2026 Michael C. Metzger)
I hope you enjoyed that!
While you're here, you might enjoy these short stories:
And for you diehards, I hope to be publishing a couple of books this year. A collection of horror shorts, and my 1st full-length novel! Stay tuned!
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