The Hat Man at the Foot of the Bed

I had heard people talk about the Hat Man online and always assumed it was sleep paralysis dressed up as a story. Then I moved into a cheap room in an old subdivided house, and I met him.

The first night I woke around three, unable to move, and there was a shape standing at the foot of the bed. Tall, thin, a long coat and a wide-brimmed hat, blacker than the dark room around him, so that he was a hole in the shadow rather than a thing in it. I could not see a face, but I knew, the way you know things in that state, that he was looking at me. After a minute I could move again, and he was gone.

I told myself it was a nightmare. The second night he was there again, closer. The third night, closer still, standing beside the pillow now, tilting that hat down toward me.