The player across from me smirks, tossing her bet onto the table, and I glance nervously at how many points she has behind. She's already in the lead, and it's the South Second Round, so a win here would probably make her a lock for first place. And yet, I can't really be mad about the situation. I still have my chances, and anyway after so many years away from the game, it's been a rush to get back into it with people who are actually good.
And no, I don't just mean, like, "know the numbers and the strategy" good. If I wanted that, I could just play online. But a proper, IRL mahjong parlor will always have a couple regulars who go beyond reasonable ABC gameplay and into something more mysterious. There's a reason nobody at a "promateur" or higher level follows the old warnings to keep the room brightly lit anymore; I think if you take the game seriously, you're either an anti-occult ideologue who wouldn't care either way, or you're the kind of person who prefers, on some level, a game where unknown forces lurk tableside, playing at the crossroads, gathering at bones.
Even if I probably don't have those forces kibitzing from my own seat.
Probably.
Okay. It's my turn, and the tile I draw gives me a few options for what to wait on. Now think. Line the symbols up. She's clearly got some amount of supernatural wind behind her, which means she has an idiom. What's she been winning off of all night? Come to think of it, she's gotten a large straight three or four times, right? That's hardly a common yaku to go for, so let's assume it's a pattern that often finds its way to her. And she called that triplet of west wind earlier, so she's almost certainly on a small flush too... bamboo, if her discards are any indication. So that means...
I suppress a grin of my own, trying to look tentative instead as I discard the 9-sou. It could be her winning tile, but if so, a large straight would require getting the last 9-sou in the deck; it'd be a risky wait to commit to by reaching. More importantly, discarding bamboo makes it look like I don't know what's going on, and will let me safely incorporate a couple of her winning tiles into my hand. And if the winning tile happens to be...
"Ron!" she calls, and speak of the devil, there it is. The guy to my left discards a red 5-sou - her winning tile - but unfortunately for her, it's also one of mine. "Head bump," I interrupt, allowing myself to grin a little this time. "Pair straight, red dragon, dora. 5200."
The point sticks change hands. She's looking at me with annoyance, but also more than a tinge of newfound respect. Now she knows I know, and that I can, in my own sideways way, play on her level... which means these last couple hands are going to get very interesting indeed.
