Gnik the Dreamer - Art Prompt Writing Contest #4

First ever story I've written not as a school assignment. Thanks @gmuxx for setting up the contest. It's more of a rough draft, but hope people enjoy it regardless and if you do take the time to read let me know your thoughts in the comments down below.

It was an ordinary morning, much like any of the past 11045mornings that Gnik has experienced exploring the lands of Halantia the past 11,045 days of his existence, but this day felt different. This was Gnik’s day to prove himself to the world. You see in Gnik’s eyes he was a screw up, someone who was never good enough, and never compared to the best of the Halentians of the past, but he knew today was the day.

As he put some leaves and twigs on the ashes of the fire that was the night before, Gnik saw a gold glowing object out of the corner of his eye just across the stream he had slept by that night. This was no ordinary gold glow, but something you would imagine when reading that of a gold glow out of a fairy tale or some hero story like King Arthur.

As he thought to himself it was strange that he didn’t see the object in the dark the night before, he began to strip down to his underwear so he could cross the stream and inspect the object. The stream was freezing when he took his first step in, but that did nothing to deter Gnik since his eyes were still on the prize. Once on the other side of the stream he picked up what appeared to be a coin of some sort. “Put it in your pocket” he heard a cold voice say with a chill.
Brrrr Gnik thought as he felt the icy chill pass over him, I probably throw this in the stream. He thought about putting it in his pocket just to see what would happen, but decided against it and just held it in his hand as he swam back across to his camp site.

While investigating the coin, the leaves and twigs had caught fire so he decided to start making some eggs and bacon for breakfast. While the bacon was cooking he packed up what little he had and sat down to eat breakfast.

While eating Gnik remembered he still had the coin and opened up his hand so he could examine it. The coin was no longer glowing, but was remarkably shiny for how old the coin looked and the muddy location in which he found it. There were no special markings on the coin to indicate where it was from or who it belonged to and was rather plain looking.

Thinking nothing of it he put the coin in his pocket and all of the sudden was fast forwarding through his life, at first an hour at a time, a year at a time, and then before he knew it his entire life had passed before his eyes with all the memories he had ever experienced from birth until death.

Woah that was strange, he thought to himself. What a strange mix of emotions. You see he could remember all the joys, pains, sorrows, success, and failures in that instance after putting the coin in his pocket, of his past and his future. At first he focused on all the great things he will do in the future. All the dragons he had slayed and beautiful maidens in tall towers he would save, and after some time had passed started focusing on all the failures of the future and mistake that would be made.

“Let’s try this again, I can do better”, he said to no one in particular as he pulled the coin out of his pocket and began to put the coin back in and then phwoosh, it was like it was happening all over again, but this time he felt as if he could control what was about to happen. He was able to fix some of his wrongs, and reveled in his victories as he knew when he was about to approach them. “Yeah dude that’s awesome,” Gnik exclaimed.

You see that coin wasn’t a blessing it was a curse. Gnik spent the rest of his days watching the life he could have had trying to make it the perfect life. Instead of going out and living his imperfect life which would lead him to become an amazing, yet imperfect individual that would have changed the world for the better even if he would have left behind a few scars, he spent all his time looking at the glowing object imagining what could be.

How, like Gnik, are we that we spend much of our time staring at a computer screen looking at friends, family, and maybe even people we’ve never met before wishing to be more like them. To be able to have the things they have or make the impact on the world that they make. All as our lives pass before us, our kids grow up, or significant others grow apart without realizing the imperfect lives in front of us should be the perfect lives we should be living and giving our all. Even if we leave a few scars behind.