The Phantom Intruder

I'm not entirely sure if this is a ghost story, but I thought I would post it on here anyways because I have some reasons to suspect otherwise.

To give some ideas about my house - my room is on the second floor and I always sleep with the door closed and locked. My parents' room is near my bedroom, but theirs is right by the stairs. My brother's room is across the hall from me. My bedroom is right above the kitchen, so I can hear basically anything that goes on down there.

My family also has two cats. During the night, one of them is always in my parents' room or on top of the stairs, while the other one plays around, eats, or sleeps. My cats are terrified of other people, so if anyone outside my immediate family is ever in the house, you won't be able to find either of them for hours.

About two years ago, a few days after Christmas, I was woken up in the middle of the night by a bang. I assumed that maybe I had dreamed the sound, or one of my two cats had knocked something over during the night. I thought nothing of it, until a few minutes later, when I heard a man's voice, talking in a low tone. I could hear his voice, but not make out the words he was saying. This terrified me. I wondered if someone was in the house.

I felt my suspicions might be confirmed when I heard a chair move in the kitchen a few minutes later. A loud noise, followed by a man's voice, and a chair moving? Someone might be in the house. I was terrified. I was starting to get out of bed, planning on creeping over to the top of the stairs to see if I could see or hear anything (no point in waking my family up for nothing), when I heard footsteps in the hall.

About half of the upstairs hallway is covered with carpet, muffling any noise. But the hallway branches off, and in this branch off the hallway is all wood. This branch off leads to my sister's room, but the branch off itself is pretty close to my room. No matter how silent anyone tries to be, I can hear them in this hallway. It definitely sounded like someone was walking on this wood.

At this point, I was absolutely terrified. But I continued to try to logic with myself. Maybe my sister was up and that's what I heard. But it didn't explain the man's voice. Maybe my brain wasn't fully awake? My mind was completely racing, trying to figure out what was going on, and what to do.

I still didn't want to wake my parents up for nothing. And twenty minutes went by without my hearing a thing. I decided to open the door and look out in the hallway. If I didn't see a cat sitting at the top of the stairs (or a person in the hallway!) I planned to hurry into my parents' room. If a cat wasn't there, it meant someone was in the house and my cats were hiding, so I would wake up my parents. I quietly unlocked my door, but was still too scared to go outside.

I was shaking uncontrollably at this point. I was clinging to the doorknob, trying to garner up the courage to open the door. I had unlocked the door, but was far too terrified to even attempt to turn the knob. Unlocking it was the easy part. I could have sworn I felt like a hand was on the other side of the doorknob, but I was shaking so much, I could have completely mistaken this.

Just when I felt like I had gathered up the courage, the door began to open very slowly. Panicked, I slammed the door shut. I swear that I felt like there was pressure on the door, like someone was on the other side, trying to push the door open. Luckily, my phone was charging within arm's reach. I managed to grab it, and called my mother's cell phone.

As soon as my mom's phone started ringing (I could hear it from my room), the pressure on the door disappeared. My mom picked up, and I frantically told her that someone was in the house. My parents searched the whole house, but they didn't find anyone. No one was in the house.

I told my parents everything, and they tried to reason things out. I either dreamed the bang or heard a cat knock something over, the voice I heard was probably my dad or brother (who will both, on occasion, talk in their sleep), the kitchen chair moving was just a cat, and the door started to open because the air turned on.

But, I'm not sure how true all of this is. Maybe I dreamed the bang. We found no sign of anything being knocked over, so it definitely wasn't our cats. And the voice sounded nothing like my brother or dad. When I have my door closed, I can't hear voices in my parents' room or my brother's. I can only hear voices in the hallway or the kitchen below.

We still have no explanation for the footsteps, as both my siblings deny waking up during the night. My parents have a bathroom attached to their bedroom, so they wouldn't be in the hallway at night either. And my cats walking on the floor sounds very different than a person walking on it. The kitchen chairs were all completely pushed in during the morning, so it doesn't seem like a cat moved them. And the air turning on wouldn't feel like a person pushing on the other side of the door (or even a hand on the doorknob if that was not caused by my shaking). The air has, on occasion, pushed open my bedroom door. But, the door has to be partially open to begin with, and it opens quickly. I can also hear the air turning on when this happens, and I don't remember that at all. In fact, I recall the air turning on while my parents were searching the house.

Another odd thing is that neither of our cats were in my parents' room or on top of the stairs when I woke my mom up, or when my parents searched the house. They never hide without reason.

My only explanation is a ghost. Although, in a post I submitted earlier, I've mentioned that I have a ghost protector, a lady who shows up and has warned me not to open the door before (http://www.yourghoststories.com/real-ghost-story.php?story=22650#comment). Yet, she didn't appear this time. Maybe that means I would have been safe, or maybe that means it wasn't a ghost. But, I believe that there's at least two bad ghosts in the house but this female protector ghost did not show up when these two were around. (I'll try to get to posting those stories soon.) The odd thing is, the time she told me not to open the door, was also a few days after Christmas, years earlier.

Another odd thing is that I haven't felt entirely alone in the room while typing this. I keep feeling like someone is beside me even though no one is there. And the blinds keep banging against the window and the third blind up from the bottom won't stop vibrating. But, the air's off and it isn't windy outside.