The Child at the Foot of the Bed

I've always been the nervous type. Even in college, when I came home for winter break, I still slept in my mother's room. Better safe than sorry, right?That night, I woke up needing to use the bathroom. I rubbed my eyes, adjusted to the dark—and froze.Hovering just above my mother's feet, maybe a meter in the air, was a child. Blue and white stripes. Tiny. Maybe two or three years old. Its movements were wrong—jerky, unnatural. One small hand waving up and down in the air, like it was reaching for something no one else could see.Transparent. I could see right through it.My first instinct was to scream. My second was to remind myself: you've been through this before. You've seen things like this your whole life.鬼压床. Sleep paralysis. You've dealt with worse.So I just... stayed calm. Watched it for a few seconds until it faded. Then I got up and used the bathroom like nothing happened.But nothing is ever nothing.A few weeks later, it happened again. Except this time, it was worse.It started with sound. I was studying late, wearing ear muffs to block out the world, when I heard something in the distance. That summer pond sound—crickets, frogs, that soft rustling white noise. But from far away. Then the sounds began to move closer. And closer. Like something was approaching through the dark.I fell asleep and immediately felt a presence near my ear. Something flapping. Almost like wings, but not quite. Too close. Too wrong.Then I woke up. Or I thought I did.I could think clearly. I could hear everything. But I couldn't move. My body was stuck, pinned down by something I couldn't see. I struggled for what felt like forever, until somehow I slipped back under.Same thing happened again. I woke up, fully conscious, trapped. And this time I could feel things on me. Pressing on my face. My nose. My right cheek. My stomach. My feet. Like something was crawling over my body from the head of the bed.I panicked inside my own head. I started reciting anything I could remember—Buddhist mantras, prayers, anything. Amitabha. Buddha's name. The Zhu Chi Mantra. Nothing worked. The pressure continued. The sounds continued. Whatever was on me was not interested in letting go.Finally, in desperation, I thought: Please. Just let me go. Please.And I woke up. For real this time.But here's what haunts me most: when I was reciting those prayers, I felt like my hands were pressed together. But they didn't feel like my hands. They felt like... something else. Like I was controlling a body that wasn't mine.People ask me why I'm interested in this stuff. Why I don't just dismiss it as imagination. But here's the thing: I don't normally have hallucinations. I don't hear things that aren't there. I don't see things that don't exist. Except when I'm sleeping. Except when something comes for me in the dark.So tell me—what is幻觉 and what is real? What is this world really made of?I'm still looking for answers. And I'm still afraid to sleep.