The Working Fomo

It was December 22nd, and Liam sat at his desk, staring at the blinking cursor on his laptop. The words “Out of Office Reply” glared back at him, but he couldn’t bring himself to finish writing it. Work was his life—a demanding marketing job for a startup that didn’t understand the concept of “holidays.” Every time he tried to log off, another Slack notification would pull him back in.

Somewhere in his phone, buried under unopened messages, were invitations from his friends and family. Ugly sweater parties. Cookie decorating contests. His best friend’s annual “Queer & Cheer” Christmas dinner. Liam had RSVP’d to exactly none of them.

And dating? Forget it. His Hinge profile still had “pumpkin spice enthusiast” as his bio. He hadn’t even opened the app since Halloween.

Instead, Liam spent his evenings clutching a cup of instant cocoa, too tired to do anything but scroll Instagram. And there it was, night after night—the endless stream of posts. His cousin snowboarding in Aspen. His coworker Sam kissing some guy under mistletoe. His ex, Jeremy, dressed as a sexy reindeer at a rooftop bar.

FOMO clawed at his chest like a bad pop song he couldn’t escape. But every time he thought about going out, his body screamed, You need sleep! So, he did what he always did: worked late, passed out on the couch, and woke up with just enough energy to repeat the cycle.

December 23rd

Liam’s phone buzzed during a rare moment of downtime. It was a voice note from his best friend, Cara.

“Okay, babe. I know you’re probably busy building capitalism or whatever, but you have to come to ‘Queer & Cheer’ tomorrow night. It’s tradition. And I swear if you ghost me like last year, I’ll haunt you into 2025. Love you, mean it!”

Liam chuckled but didn’t reply. He knew she’d already started planning his outfit in case he did show up—something sparkly, something “festively slutty.” The thought exhausted him.

That night, he tried to sleep but kept waking up in a cold sweat. The dream was always the same: he’d be at his laptop, working on a campaign, when his friends would burst in, shouting, “Why weren’t you at Christmas karaoke?!” Then they’d pull him into a snowy void where Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” played on a loop.

By morning, Liam was done pretending everything was fine.

December 24th

Liam stood in his kitchen, staring at the fridge. Inside, there was a sad leftover salad, a bottle of oat milk, and a half-empty jar of cranberry sauce he’d forgotten to throw out after Thanksgiving.

You need to leave the apartment, he thought.

He got dressed—not in Cara’s “festively slutty” vision, but in a chunky sweater and jeans—and grabbed the unopened bottle of red wine he’d bought weeks ago. He decided to surprise Cara by actually showing up to “Queer & Cheer.”

But as he stepped outside, something felt…off.

The streetlights flickered faintly, casting long, eerie shadows over the snow-covered sidewalk. The city was usually buzzing with life this close to Christmas, but tonight it felt deserted.

Liam shook it off and walked toward Cara’s building, a few blocks away. Halfway there, he heard something—or someone—following him. The sound of crunching snow. He glanced back, but the street was empty.

The FOMO-fueled Mariah Carey nightmare returned to his mind. He chuckled nervously. “Calm down. It’s just the wind or something.”

Then his phone buzzed. A text from Cara:

“Hey! Just checking—are you on your way? The party’s wild already. You better not flake!”

Liam sighed with relief. It was all in his head.

As he reached her building, the eerie feeling returned. The windows were dark. No music, no lights, no sign of a party.

He called Cara. No answer.

“Great. Either I got the wrong address or she’s messing with me,” Liam muttered, gripping the wine bottle tightly.

He checked his texts again. The message from Cara was gone.

“What the…”

Suddenly, the door to the building creaked open. A voice—faint, familiar—floated through the air.

“Liam…”

He froze. “Cara? Is that you?”

No response.

Against every instinct, he stepped inside. The lobby was empty except for a faint trail of glitter leading to the elevator. Cara was a glitter fiend, so that felt plausible. But as he followed it, the air grew colder.

When the elevator doors opened, he heard Mariah Carey’s voice—soft at first, then louder, echoing down the hall.

This time, it wasn’t funny.

“Cara, if this is a joke, it’s not cute!” he shouted, stepping out of the elevator.

At the end of the hall, a door creaked open. Inside, the apartment was glowing, but the lights flickered like a faulty Christmas tree.

Liam stepped in, heart pounding. The living room was decorated as if for a party, but no one was there. Only a table full of untouched food, Cara’s favorite holiday playlist on repeat, and a single note:

“You finally made it.”

“Okay, this is officially creepy,” Liam whispered. He turned to leave, but the door slammed shut.

Before he could panic, Cara and their friends burst out from the kitchen, screaming, “Surprise!”

Liam dropped the wine bottle.

“What the—Cara! I thought—”

“You thought you were being haunted by your own bad decisions?” Cara teased, pulling him into a hug.

His friends laughed and passed him a glass of cider.

“See? This is what you miss when you say no to life, babe,” she said, winking.

For the first time all season, Liam felt warm—like he’d finally stepped out of the endless loop of work, sleep, and FOMO.

He raised his glass, a small grin creeping across his face. “To Cara: the only ghost of Christmas that actually scares me.”

And for once, he meant it.