The Green Imp - A Demon Tale

This story takes place in 1975, at the time I was only 5 years old, but this event has been burned into my memory and don't believe I shall ever forget it.

My parents and I had taken a road trip to California to see my mother's aunt and uncle who lived in Fresno. This trip crosses long stretches of Nevada desert and took place sometime in the Fall (these were the days before air conditioning was standard in vehicles) so it wasn't very hot, but I do remember it being quite warm.

Anyways, after our visit was over and we headed back to Salt Lake City, which is where we lived, we had taken a different route that my mom's uncle had said was faster, but we ended up getting very lost!

Wandering around on Nevada's backroads, it was starting to get late, my parents had been arguing, and can remember being very hungry. We finally came across a small town, not really sure it classified as a town, it had a motel, a gas station, a restaurant, and about a half dozen trailer homes. So we stopped for the night.

First we checked into the motel, which only had a basement room available with 2 double beds in it, left our suitcases and wandered over to the restaurant to eat. After dinner, my father got directions back to the main highway and we went back to our room for the night.

Let me paint the picture of this room: it had no carpeting on the floor just concrete, the double beds where against one wall with 1 small window above them. I really can't remember the color scheme but I remember the bathroom only had a toilet and a sink in it. Anyways, I remember the beds were hard as rocks and couldn't get to sleep right away so to get comfortable, I had a habit of letting my arm hang down the side of the bed. I slept a lot on my stomach as a kid, for some reason, this made it easier to get to sleep and I faded off.

I was fast asleep when I felt something tug at my arm. We had a dog named Christie, an English Setter, who sometimes would tug at my arm while I was sleeping letting me know that she wanted to play, but on this trip, we hadn't brought her along. So I mumbled to her to stop it and to let me sleep. A little while later, felt the tug again, but a little harder this time. It was enough to wake me almost completely. I looked around and didn't see anything then put my head back down with my arm on the side again.

Moments later, this tug pulled me all the way off the bed. I landed hard on the floor and started screaming for my mom. My mom jumped up and saw what was happening. This greenish ball of mist with a sickening bright green glowing center had pulled me off the bed and had started dragging me across the floor. I can remember being held in a weird vise like grip but not being able to see any hands holding onto me.

Well my mom jumped out of bed and ran up behind this thing and screamed, 'No!' Then she smacked it with her hand which made contact with the thing and you could hear a loud smacking sound. Once this thing was hit, it let go of my arm and let out a high pitched scream like I have never heard before. It started whirling around like a funnel then disappeared into the drain that was located in the center of the room. My dad had slept through most of this and hadn't woken up until he heard the thing scream. I ended up sleeping between my parents this rest of the night with no further incidents.

Years later, I was telling this story to someone who had a great deal of experience with the paranormal and supernatural. What he told me was this: the thing I had encountered was an imp. An imp is a low level demon that feeds upon the souls of young children. They also have the ability to take shape or form and usually appear as children to other children. He also told me that folklore and mythology has some root in fact and that many of the old fables are still true today as they were hundreds of years ago. He also told me that I was very lucky. Many a missing child have ended up in the hands of these demons and have never been found. This is my story.