The old man sits there, on the bench.  He slowly puffs away on his pipe, completely ignoring the cold and snow about him.  He seems content as could be.  This surprises me a great deal considering the things I've heard, the stories about what he's been through. He takes another puff, and then his furrowed eyebrow relaxes.  He speaks in a flat voice that never manages to become dull, “I suppose I was about 8 at the time, that seems right. Now I'm ten times that age, of course, but this is where the story begins.”
I spent years tracking this man down. I first heard the tale of Jim Wright in a coffee house with friends. That story might as well have been hearsay. Something about it though piqued my interest.  I had to find the truth, and I had to find the source. Now, here is the legend, sitting in front of me. I look at him intently, he doesn't even flinch, never even blinks.  The snow builds up upon his shoulders and hair, he doesn't bother brushing it off. He just continues on with his story.
“They always say nothing changes all at once.  That it takes many small events to add up and create change. This isn't my experience, the moment that demon took my soul away, I was changed for good.  One moment.  So there I was...

In bed, tucked in, lights out.  It's pretty normal for kids to be afraid of the dark, but I never was.  This night was somehow different.  There was a certain taint to the air.  The trees outside were dying, it was cold.  It's all these things that children pick up on that adults aren't capable of any more.
My closet was open.  It's common for kids to be afraid of monsters in the closet, I don't think I was, but that door was normally kept shut, so I was on edge.  Like I said, it must have been something in the air.
I was an adventurous kid, man the trouble I would get into...but that's a different story.  I decided I would close the door.  As I was unraveling the covers about me my eyes caught something glinting in the closet.  Just my imagination, I thought.  I didn't have the time to get out of bed though.  Something stepped out of the closet.  It was mostly hominid in form, but with black, leathery skin that seemed stretched across it's tall, lanky figure.  The face gave the creature away though.  It had large eyes, too large to be human, and the pupils were just as black as the rest of it.  It had only slits where the nose should be, but there was something else that bothered me most.  The mouth.  It was simply too large, and too wide.  It stretched from ear to ear, if the creature had ears, which it was also lacking.  It never really spoke to me, that is, I never saw that mouth move, but it must've spoken telepathically.  Don't tell me you don”t believe in that kind of thing, you wouldn't be here if you didn't.  Anyway, it's voice was raspy, and choppy.  It could only speak in broken English, which frightened me even more.
“Stay...in bed, young one...it will...be easier...on you, and me...Do not worry...it's useless...you cant, stop this....I am rushed...so...I will be quick...this is a mercy to you, trust me....stay still.”
I was frightened as hell, and of course had no intent to just lay there, but when I caught eyes with it I became paralyzed.  I couldn't move if I wanted to.
It seemed to float towards me, it had an abnormal grace about it.  Only when its face was inches from my own did it's mouth open.  Even then, I would describe it more as the jaw unhinging itself.  The creature had rows of teeth equal in breadth to its mouth, and they all came to a sharp point.  All of them were as white as the snow outside, and they produced the glinting I saw earlier.
“They...call me, Stoul...I...”
Then it bent down, at that point I froze.  Theres no way to describe the very life being eaten out of you, but if had to put it into words I would say it was like being thrown under a lake covered in ice, and then having every vein in your body cut open.  Only with what old Stoul did to me I wouldn't die, and after about five minutes I couldnt feel anything at all.
He began floating backwards, retreating the same way he had come.  His mouth was still open, only his teeth were now stained crimson, and his eyes were bloodshot.
“Well...Bye...” he said, and somehow his smile managed to widen.  My arm extended out to him yearning for what he had taken.  I take back what I said earlier about not feeling anything. All I could feel was immense yearning for what I had lost, my soul.

“You've heard the story before right, so you know how it ends?  The troubles I went through growing up, and my quest to track down Stoul and get my soul back.  Its not new to you, is it?” he asks.
“No,” I say, “But I'd like to hear it from you.” He shrugs, and checks his watch, taking a very long drag from his pipe at the same time.
“Hell, I've got the time,” he says, and exhales the smoke which disperses about him, “But do you?”
At that he manages the slightest chuckle.