Dead Dreams

Eight

Do you know how to play rummy? I heard Iris ask from his place at the sink, washing our dishes. I felt bad that he was doing them, but he refused any help.

"I don't." I called back. I never learned how to play complex games with cards.

He hummed, thinking for a moment. "Alright then, I can teach you."

Now finished with the dishes, he sat them on a drying rack before wiping his hands and making his way back to me. However before he got to me, he stopped and turned to a side table I hadn't noticed before. Pulling open a drawer, he fished through before pulling out a deck of cards. It seemed to be in a very worn condition. Like they had been used for years. He brought them over to the table before sitting down, elegant as always.

"Alright!" My eyes snapped from the deck of cards to him, due to the unusually louder tone that he had used. I noticed he seemed to be very happy. Happier than normal.

"So, I will first deal us both seven cards to play with." He stated this as he opened the cards and shuffled them with an efficiency I had never once seen before. "I am going to deal both of our hands face up this time, as this will be a practice round." I nodded, watching the cards seemingly fly to their respective places in front of both of us. When he was done dealing, he took the card from the top of the pile and sat both in the center. One card right side up, a six, and the rest in a face-down pile.

"Oh, it seems like you already have the upper hand." He pointed to my cards. To me, it just looked like a random assortment of numbers and symbols. "First you should take a card from one of these piles, but for now we are going to take this. He pulled the six off of the table. "Now, You can lay these down here, because they are a suit." He pulled out three cards from my hand, Four, Five, and a seven. He used the six he had gotten to make them go in order before laying them out on the table before us. "Since you can't do anything else, You should end your turn by discarding one of your cards. I would recommend this." He pulled the second five from my hand and placed it face up on the table, where the six had previously been.

"Now it is my turn, but I am not going to take the five since it isn't going to be very useful to me. Instead, I am going to draw." He drew a king. "Well, That isn't helpful." He proceeded to put the king into the discard pile. "Back to you. Why don't you try drawing?" I drew a queen. "Oh, wow." He proceeded to take the nine from my hand and put the queen with the other two queens I happened to have. He then placed my queens beside the suit and discarded the nine.

He began to chuckle earnestly. It surprised me, but it was not unwelcome. He had such a nice laugh, it was smooth and clear. He held his hand up slightly to block me from seeing the small smile that accompanied such a laugh. He calmed himself down after about a minute to talk. "I think that is the quickest I have ever been beaten." He said, the smile still lingering on his face from just a minute ago. "Your luck is astounding."

"Not really. This was just a practice round, right?" I shifted back and forth in my seat, avoiding looking at his face. I began to fiddle with my fingers slightly.

"I think you should revel in this win while you can, Ruth, as I am quite good at this game. I will not be letting you win just as easily in our future rounds." He said playfully, though I could sense a hint of determination hidden within his eyes.

"Okay."

He seemed to pause for a moment, and he put the cards down on the table. My eyes were drawn to his face, but I didn't make eye contact. He seemed a bit more serious now. I started to rub my fingers, not harsh enough to hurt myself, but it was enough to keep me looking still and calm outwardly.

He spoke with a soft voice, one that poured with feeling, it was something that I was unaccustomed to from anyone else I had ever known. Then again, many things about him were things I was unaccustomed to. He was a strange person.