Learning the basics of UNO

"You just look like you've just been dropped into an alternate world and you can suddenly see yourself without a mirror!" Jake suddenly said after seeing the sullen expression on my face. Which meant he was looking down at me. Which was even worse! "What's with that awfully vivid simile you made?" I asked, genuinely curious if he was into the occult or alternate worlds. "Uhhh.... you want to learn how to play UNO?" Jake tried to change the subject, awfully conspicuously. "Yeah, sure!" I agreed, but not totally ignoring his subject change. Nowwwwwwww more information I probably won't understand! I felt a little airheaded, but I went along with what Jake was saying anyways.

Jake took out a deck of neat-looking cards, which looked pretty large for a deck of cards. All of the cards had a neat looking design, with the capital letters 'UNO' printed on the back, in bold. "These look cool!" I said in awe, examining the cards on the bottoms as he was shuffling them. "Yeah, these cards are the pinnacle of unique!" Jake announced, proudly, for reasons unknown. "I know the lady on the loudspeaker went over some rules, but she went really fast! It's like one of those news reporters who talk to fast for you to follow along!" I complained / grumbled.

"Hey, I'll explain it to you! I'm not too bad myself in explaining the rules and playing the game!" Jake interjected loudly, in my face. I raised an eyebrow, high enough for him to notice and start getting irritated. "Uh-huh! I'm really competent in this subject!" Jake tried to prove his point, but he was definitely pushing his child-like nature to the max. "Yeah, I believe you." I stretched out the words, dripping them with sarcasm.

Without giving him time to rebut that, I went on, "Now will you explain to me what's going on?" "Ok," Jake exhaled before continuing, "So you deal seven cards out, not starting on yourself, obviously." he said while dealing the cards quickly, one by one. "Then you take the top card of of the deck, and place it face up. That is the color you start on, unless it's a wild card, and the person who starts will get to choose the color!" I nodded in understanding, following along rapidly. "So, now you can look at your cards!" Jake announced, as he took his cards, and flipped them so only he could see, holding them up to his face. I did the same, trying to hide the cards. "Ok, so you start off with these seven cards, and you try to get rid of them, and whoever gets rid of all their cards first wins! That's the goal of the game, although the rules are a bit more complicated than that.

So you have cards of different colors, red, yellow, green, and blue. They are numbered one through nine, in all the diffrent colors. The number cards," Jake explained, scanning the deck, and held out a blue 2, "look somewhat like this. No pictures, no nothing!" Jake pit it at the bottom, then continued, "Then there are the other cards, I call them action cards!" he then scanned the deck another time, but for a little longer, then pulled out a green card with a sign that looked like a "do not go past this point" sign. "This is a skip card, which means you skip the next person to go after yours' turn!" He put it at the bottom of the deck aswell, then pulled out a yellow card with two curved arrows pointing in the opposite directions, and explained, "This is a reverse card! It changes the direction of the game, so if the person on your left were to go next, it would now be the person on your right, vice versa!" He surprisingly put that in the middle of the deck.

"And finally, out of the colored cards, there is the best one!" Jake scanned the deck, *again*, and found a red card with a +2 sign in each corner, and 2 cards in the middle, which were also red. "This is the draw two card, which forces the next person to draw two cards! Handy, right?" He also put that in the middle of the deck. "And there are two overpowered cards, which can change the flow of the game very easily, the wild and wild draw four cards!" Jake said like an announcer, as he pulled out two cards. One looked like a circle, split into four diffrent colors, seperated by a white line, with the word bolded and capitalized "WILD". Jake held that up closer, and said, "This is a wild card! It changes the color to whatever you want! Really useful in a crisis! And now, the best but most point-giving in the game, the wild draw four!" Jake held the other one in my face, which had the +4 sign in the top right, and four cards overlapping each other in the middle, each one the four colors of the game, red, yellow, green,and blue. "Not only do you get to change the color, you also get to force the other opponent to DRAW FOUR CARDS!!!" Jake put the cards back in random places this time. He looked really into this. I was kind of shocked, but at the same time, I understood.

"Ok, I will be accepting questions before we start!" Jake said in a narrator like voice, I was impressed his voice can go that low from being so high all the time. "Uhhh first question! Can you place a skip upon a skip? Even if they are diffrent colors?" I asked, feeling a bit confused. "Yes, you can! As well as reverses, draw two's, wild's, and wild draw fours! Also numbers, so technically cards of the same type can be placed upon each other. Like number cards with the same number, no matter what color, can be put on top of each other! Also, different number cards with the same color can be placed on top of each other!" "Ohhhh, ok!" I realized, feeling less confused.

"Oh, I almost forgot!" Jake suddenly said aloud, then continuing, "When you are about to play your second to last card, you have to say "UNO!" before someone calls you out, then you have to draw four cards! But if they don't before they play a card, you are safe and sound!" "Oh, so I have to be super aware when they start running low on cards?" I asked, wanting to confirm. "Yup, righty-o!" Jake flashed me a thumbs up shining me one of those big smiles, like the sun on a hot day. Bright, and kind of blinding, to be honest. "So will we start now?" I asked, gesturing to his cards on the table, and Jake quickly picked those up before he coughed, then replied, "Alright, you start, because I dealt! Common card etiquette!" I looked at my cards. A red 7, and 1, a yellow 4, a blue 4, 0, and skip, and finally-

Jake placed down a red 5 on top of the starting blue 5, and then he starting ordering his cards. I placed down the blue skip, and Jake suddenly said, "Already? Jeez, you're ruthless!" even though he was grinning. I started to feel a little weird, looking at his smile... then I put down the blue 4. Jake pulled out a green four, and placed it down on the table. I then followed closely, putting that yellow 4 I had. Then, he played a yellow 3. Dang it, out of yellow! Then I asked him, "Hey, what do you do if you can't play a card?" "Oh, so you can't play? Then just draw a card from the draw pile! But only one!" he warned, pointing at the draw pile. I silently grabbed a card that said, yellow 7. I asked another question, "Hey, if you get a card tha-" "If you get a card that can play when you draw, go ahead and play if you want to! If not, then keep it!" Jake interrupted me. I shuddered, creeped out he read my mind like a book.

I put down the yellow 7, and immediately after, he drew a card. I then put down the red 7 I had, hiding in the depths of my hand. Then Jake drew another card, still smiling. I played the red 1, leaving me with two cards to play. He's still smiling! I can't see anything under that stupid poker face! His smile even feels genuine! Even though he has 6 cards...

With these two cards, I can win! Using the draw 4 I kept, I can actually win! He played the card I really needed, after he draw again, he placed down a red 0. Yes! I placed down the blue zero I had from the beginning, then I quickly called out, "UNO!" Was that me, or did Jake smile even more? He then drew another card, looking a little visibly disappointed. Then, I claimed the game with the draw four I had.

"Haha! Good game!" Jake clapped with the cards in his hands, then showed me his cards. They were all yellow, two 6's and 8's and a 9, and a 0 and 2. "Wow, what had luck you have!" I pointed out, kind of giggling, but still looking up at him though. "That smile of yours was kind of freaking me out though..." I added, a little reluctantly, but then Jake said something that took me by suprise. "Everyone tells me that whenever I play with them! I guess it's my specialty, but really, it's fun, right? And you know how to play, right?" Jake stated, "So, it's a win-win!" he said throwing his hands into the air.

After that, we put the cards up, and just decided to watch television for the rest of the day. We just watched a new anime for who knows why, but I thought it was good, so I was fine. I also drew some anime while watching, and saying commentary with Jake, so it was really entertaining! For dinner, we settled on just having instant noodles, so I grabbed the instant noodle cups supplied already, then heated them both up in the microwave. After that was done, we sat on the floor in front of a nice coffee colored coffee table, and our instant noodles on there.

Shortly after our binge-watching spree, we went to the separate beds, and said goodnight to eachother, before I was lost in my own conscious, worried about tomorrow's exciting events...