At the end of her life she wasn't ready to die. It was only then that she realized that it was not death she feared, but having not lived. Six decades she'd passed in constant 

FOMO

. And now that she was at what was the end of it, she realized that she had missed out on the most important thing of it all.

It wasn't the big news stories, or the magical 

New Yorker

article, or an art exhibit that you just had to be at.

She missed out on something more precious. Her own life. 

Who's had she lived through this entire time? 

When staring into the white ceiling she thought about this. In the intermittent moments when a nurse came and talked to her she felt close to the truth. 

She had lived the lives of others. What she thought they wanted her to be like. So much and so long that she thought that what she thought they wanted her to be was what she wanted to be. But for the first time she knew that she never listened to herself. She never knew herself existed, because now all alone, dying in a hospital bed, she finally heard herself. Saw her. 

"It is okay." she said. 

Still she cried. She couldn't believe her. It is not okay she said. I didn't live.

"Believe me it is okay. Everything will be okay." she said.

I don't believe you! I want to live! I promise I'll do it differently this time around!

...


....


Are you there? she said aloud actually into the room. A person in hallway glanced over for a moment before continuing to walk away.

No. She was no longer there. She was gone. And now she would die.