Loss

We have quite the dysfunctional family dynamic on my mother's side. None one talks about the youngest aunt. My grandfather enables my addicted uncle, so they are blacklisted. There's the wealthy uncle who doesn't consort with lesser individuals like ourselves. There's my mom who has always run away from her problems and taken the easiest way possible. Then there's my auntie. She has always been a tough person in my life to define. She's one of those people that you love, partly because you have to and partly because you crave their attention, their recognition and their love. One of those people that you try to stay away from because you know you'll never measure up, you'll never be acceptable and they'll always cut you down.
Growing up, my aunt played a more prominent role in my life. I can vividly remember going to the beach with her and my cousins and the little sandwiches we'd scramble to eat before they got too soggy. She would press a five dollar bill into my hand and send M and I to the video store to rent whatever we wanted. When M and I slept outside on the patio, she would always come out just as we were getting too cold to stay, and bring us an extra comforter. I always looked up to her and saw a strong, independant woman, which was the opposite of my mom. She was hard on us though, and as I got older and difference between my mom and aunt grew larger, she could be mean. One Christmas, when knee high socks came back into style, I came to the family dinner wearing a new skirt and socks that I was proud of. She said I looked like a whore. I was maybe 13. Over the years she's told my cousin, my best friend, that she shouldn't hang out with me for a number of different reasons. I'm an alcholic, I'm a drug addict, I'm slutty, I'm trying to get a free ride through life, I'm immoral, I'm a failure, I don't care, I run away, I'm not worth it. (you know that negative little voice you have that lives in your head? Many times she comes in my aunts voice)
As an adult, I've distanced myself from my aunt. It always hurt too much to be openly loathed. On the few occasions we had together in recent, I tried to show I wasn't any of the things she thought I was, that I wasn't a carbon copy of what she thought my mom was. So then I just tried too hard and would become her personal joke. What she never knew was that as mean as she had been to me, I had always looked up to her. She was all the things that my own mom wasn't. I respected her.
Recently my aunt was diagnosed with cancer. After tests and a chemo battle and things looking like they were improving, she started to get inflamed. She was rushed to the hospital last weekend and after more tests it's looking like the cancer has won. She has been taken off all her treatments and now they are just making her comfortable for her last few weeks. She's dying, quickly.
I want to make peace with her. I want to tell her I love her and I'll miss her and it makes me sad that we couldn't have formed a better relationship when it all counted. I want to tell her that she'll be remembered and she taught me more than she'll ever know. I want her to know that she helped shape who I am and I'm a pretty good person. I want her to know I'm there. But she doesn't want to see anyone. She doesn't even want my mom to know she's been moved into pallative care.
So now I sit with this loss, heavy in my heart. Guilt eating me for wanting to take a few moments of what little time she has left. Heartache for it probably being too late. Am I selfish for wanting to tie up that lose end of my life before it's too late?