The first time Fujiki Mihoko had ever spoken to me, it came completely out of the blue, just two months into the school year.

Club practise was coming and going as usual. Fun, enjoyable, also somewhat frustrating at the racking-up losses but the air in the club room was fresh and open. The room was massive, panelled wood flooring always kept clean to a subtle shine of polish, the dainty snack table by the doorway full of refreshments and snacks that the students not playing loved to stand around by and chatter over some biscuits. The large open windows and flowing diaphanous curtains that moved with the breeze, the constant and almost kind of soothing chatter of the young students over the multiple mahjong tables. It was peaceful. Peaceful and one of the rare days the coach was out for the day.

And then just as I turned, amid the snack table to grab a biscuit, someone got in my way and I had to blink and step back in surprise to peer at who it was.

"Hey, you!" she exclaimed with excitement. "You're Akihiko?"

I paused, for a moment taken off-guard since it wasn't hard to realise who was talking to me. Ikeda Kana, one of the regular players on the mahjong team and widely regarded as the most offensive player in the entire club. I'd seen her records myself and her point gains were absurd, she was close to the Captain in total games won but her wins trumped hers easily. Saying that, looking at her now, standing a little bit shorter than me and with the gleam in her eye, the odd shape of her bangs and the way she smiled I honestly couldn't recognise her as anything worrisome.

"Uh, yes?" I asked fully aware that I didn't sound very sure of myself.

"Great! Come with me, we're playing a game!"

What?

"What?" I wondered, verbalising my thoughts to the strange-looking upperclassman who had already managed to grab my wrist and was forcibly dragging me away. For a moment my mind had gone blank, quickly worried and then very concerned, especially because Ikeda hadn't even bothered to lower her voice and half the room were now watching us two. The mutters were going around and I felt like suddenly hiding.

Nothing though prepared me for the table itself. I must've panicked a bit too much because by the time I was aware of what was actually happening I'd already been roughly shoved into a seat. Coming back to awareness I looked across the table, spotting a bookish looking girl with grey hair and large round glasses peering at me inquisitively. I knew who she was too. Yoshitome Miharu, another regular for the team. She smiled politely at me and nodded.

"Akihiko-san, yes? Let's have a good game," she said pleasantly. I just stared at her, mustering a forced smile to my lips that must have looked awkward because Yoshitome suddenly looked worried. Two seconds ticked by before I suddenly remembered to speak.

"Ah. Uh…" I mumbled, watching as Ikeda pulled up and sat down on the seat on my right.

"Let's have a good game," the voice on my left hoped for and instinctively I turned my head to peer at the Captain of the mahjong team, Fujiki. She was all smiles like nothing was wrong with the situation, her left eye closed whilst her right peered at me with an inquisitive look. That was even more worrying.

What is happening? Why am I here?

For their part, none of the three girls - All two years older than me and fully-fledged regulars, looked like they were going to answer my thoughts. Instead the mahjong table was whizzed to life with the push of a button and the tiles popped up in neat rows.

"We'll play by the usual rules, 25,000 points with no returns. Four red dora. Yoshitome-san will be sitting East," the Captain said, which drew a subtle huff and a look of plain disappointment from Ikeda who sat directly across her, now delegated to the North seat and the last dealer. Yoshitome only smiled, already reaching for the tiles to begin building her hand and methodically the rest of us followed. Distantly I was aware of my hand collecting the tiles but I didn't feel like I was consciously doing it, instead my thoughts were in a jumble. Confused. Alarmed. And the hairs on the back of my neck felt like they were sticking up as I saw several of the club members were already gathering around this table to watch.

"Akihiko-san, would you like some cookies?"

I was jolted from my thoughts suddenly and looked to the voice - Fujiki, offering me a small plastic box filled with some dainty-looking cookies, studded with chips of chocolate. Thinking back to those tempting biscuits at the table I never managed to get my hand went right away for one of the cookies, mustering my first coherent word in the past two or three minutes.

"Um, thank you… Captain."

"Don't mind it," Fujiki assured, giving me a gentle nod as she offered the cookies about to the other two, giving me time to nibble on my cookie and arrange the tiles in front of me. The cookie was delicious, melt-in-the-mouth and sweet with a hint of… Marshmallow?

By contrast, the tiles in my hand were stale and dull. A red and green dragon, a North, a South and a random arrangement of circles and bamboo without a character tile in sight.

"Well, let's begin," Yoshitome started off, the Vice-Captain of the mahjong club drawing her first tile and immediately discarding a West. Fujiki followed, drawing and throwing away a North. Looking around the table, the three players seemed very invested in their hands, Ikeda especially for whatever reason, especially given she looked so cheery to drag me over here. I paused.

"Um, thank you for the cookie and all but why am I here?"

At once the three of them looked up. I knew for a fact this wasn't the coach's doing, she wasn't in today taking care of some business. Yoshitome looked ready to speak up when Ikeda suddenly leaned forward, flashing me a friendly grin like she hadn't just been staring a hole through her tiles.

"Hey, don't worry about it! Bundou just had to leave early so we were looking for someone to fill the seat!"

"Ah… Huh…" I mumbled. "That's… But you picked me by name."

Ikeda flinched all of a sudden and Fujiki I noticed was just watching me in silence with that same inquisitive gaze.

"Well, yeah… Hey, draw your tile already!"

And so I did, finding myself unable to say no to all three of the upperclassmen at once and I felt a small touch of disappointment when I drew a character. Nothing valuable. I discarded the South onto the table and didn't ask any more, maybe it was better to just play?

Several draws later and the table was quiet, other than the small clinks and clunks of tiles on tiles and the whispers of the students gathered around the table and over my shoulder to watch. It was awful, especially because my hand was so trash, I felt like they were judging me for my terrible luck with their eyes boring into the back of my head. At most I could get 1,000 points from this tiny hand, so it looked like I had no choice. Most of the honors, including a pair of white dragons and a red had already been thrown away.

Wait a minute…

I stopped, looked at the discards again and then immediately discarded a circles tile in the middle of my hand. The whispers and muttering behind me suddenly got louder and I could hear a lot of "What is she doing?" among them. I pursed my lips and started tapping the edge of the table nervously, eyeing Ikeda on my right. Ikeda just stared at my discard, looking about as confused as everyone else did watching, though there was no call from anyone so at least it went through.

Yoshitome and Fujiki discarded in order. No one had called yet and judging by their discards no one looked to be in tenpai yet. Nervously swallowing I reached forward to pick up the next tile in the wall and peered at it, making a face at the fateful red dragon tile.

I threw it away.

"Ron."

"Eh?" I uttered, looking up in surprise and disbelief to watch as Ikeda unveiled her hand.

"5,800!" The number was like a slap in the face, looking at the discards again and then her revealed hand, realising with disbelief that she had two red dragons and a near full set of characters! What kind of ridiculous hand was that on the sixth go-around? She hadn't even discarded any characters.

With an irritated grunt I reluctantly handed over the point sticks and Ikeda just grinned at me and uttered her thanks before leaning over to shamelessly reach for my tiles and knock them down to reveal it to the table.

"Wh-" I began, opening my mouth in straight shock at the bad manners at a mahjong table.

"Eh?" Ikeda muttered, looking at my hand and seeming confused once again. Bamboo, circles and a white and green dragon with a single character at the end. My wait was just for that single character. "What the…"

I didn't respond, taken aback by her forwardness and looked to Fujiki, who was looking at my hand with a perplexed expression. I decided to take a bite from my cookie rather than say a word.

"... OK, well, East Hand 2! Sorry about your dealership, Miharun!"

South Hand 2. Fujiki as the dealer and me down to a measly 4,400 points. I was nearing the end of my rope here. My cookie was all gone and the stares of the other club members was intense, the little critics having something to whisper about with everything I discarded. The Captain and Ikeda were both barely in the positives, Yoshitome lagging behind but she didn't look to mind being in third place.

As we came around to drawing our hands and arranging our tiles I had to pause, seeing that I'd somehow managed to get three 9 of bamboo right off the bat in an otherwise disinteresting hand. My heart leapt and suddenly my fingers were drumming on the edge of the table again, watching and waiting as Fujiki drew and discarded her tile. A North, standard stuff. Reaching for the table and pulling out my own tile I came face-to-face with a 1 of circles, throwing away a green dragon.

"Akihiko-san, you look like you're having fun," the Captain suddenly commented and I looked up sharply, feeling caught out and very aware of myself all of a sudden. I stopped drumming my fingers on the table right away.

"Ah, um… Yeah, it's fun. Playing mahjong."

"I see. You should smile more like that when you play the game," the Captain responded cryptically. Was I smiling? Oh God, did I look funny? Did I have something on my face? I instinctively wiped my face just to be sure, fortunately the Captain's attention was right away on Ikeda who threw away a bamboo, which struck me as odd.

My suspicions were confirmed. On the second go-around, Ikeda drew a tile from her hand and followed it with a point stick, throwing the stick in and discarding her tile sideways. The 9 of bamboo.

"Riichi!"

"Kan," I called right away, leaning forward to snatch the sideways tile whilst the three girls looked at me with plain surprise. I revealed my three 9 of bamboos, sliding the collected four against the side of the table and leaned forward to quickly reveal a new dora from the dead wall - South. That didn't matter, because the replacement tale I drew from the dead wall was a second 1 of circles. Suddenly I was smiling, throwing away an honor tile that I had no use for.

Luck's on my side here, I thought to myself as I shifted in my seat. The atmosphere around the table was quiet, Yoshitome looking suddenly careful about her discard, throwing away an East. Fujiki looked at her draw and quietly put it with her hand, regarding her gathered tiles for a long moment. I held my breath.

Please, please…

And it happened. She discarded a 1 of circles.

"Pon!" I called, snatching the circles tile away from her and revealing my pair to quickly gather them in the corner with my bamboos, quickly dropping a waste North. The look on Yoshitome and Ikeda's face was quite something I noticed, they both looked shocked. I had no idea why but suddenly this game felt a lot more exciting, leaning forward to grab my next tile.

The smile on my face vanished into thin air as I got a useless 6 of bamboo tile and put it down with my hand. Ikeda declared riichi after discarding a 2, then a 9 of bamboo, so most likely she had a wait on a tile from a different suit. Looking at my hand I had 8 tiles, 3, 4, 6 of characters, a pair of 2 of circles and 4, 6, 7 of bamboo, no honours left. This was a decent hand but there was no yaku, though it was only the third go-around, there was plenty of time to dig up more tiles. With the tough call to make, I eventually threw away the 7 of bamboo. No call followed. Ikeda drew her next tile.

"Tsumo, ippatsu!" she exclaimed and my head whirled and I made a noise of utter shock and dismay. "4,000, 8,000!"

I stared in disbelief and awe as Ikeda revealed a full baiman hand to the table. This girl's draws were ridiculous and like a slap in the face, I realised I was now down to 400 points. I handed over those point sticks to Ikeda with great reluctance, the upperclassman looking utterly pleased with herself as she raked in her earnings and suddenly took the lead over Fujiki by a large margin.

Damn, was all I could think.

"Akihiko-san," the Captain asked again, quickly drawing my attention away from complete dismay. I hadn't even managed win one hand yet and now it was South Hand 3!

"Um, yes?" I muttered trying to not sound as disappointed as I felt.

"Why did you call that kan on the 9 of bamboo?" Fujiki wondered, looking down at my gathered tiles at the corner of the table. Feeling self-conscious I instinctively raked them in as if to hide them from her. "I think if you'd kept them you'd have a better chance at getting a yaku."

She was right, painfully right. I wanted to say that I was planning to build a better hand over the next few turns but it sounded stupid in my head, worse because all of the spectators were now watching me closely.

"I… Um…"

Yoshitome quickly cut in after I sat there in silence. "Don't worry about it, Akihiko-san. You should be more cautious about calling tiles in the future," she advised and I looked to her with relief, making a genuine smile whilst avoiding that long stare Fujiki still had on me. It felt like I was being put under a microscope and I didn't even understand why.

My turn came around as dealer and I didn't even have time to reach tenpai before Yoshitome drew her winning tile and called tsumo on a concealed hand, knocking my points down to 0 and ending the game immediately. Without even saying goodbye I pushed my hand down onto the table and quickly rose from the chair, turning and heading out for the door before the third year students could stop me. The staring had become unbearable and I had to get out of there, noticing from the corner of my eye that Captain Fujiki had risen from her seat as well and opened her mouth to say something. Whatever it was I was already out of there.

The next day before club I quickly went to the bathroom. Classes had finished for the day and despite a subtle itch on my fingertips, eager to touch the mahjong tiles, I also felt a sense of dread in my stomach. After what happened yesterday I could only think of what the other club members might say, after all I got invited to a game with third year regulars for no reason and didn't even win one hand. I was definitely suspicious and worried, remembering how evasive Ikeda had been with my questions while they checked my hands and questioned my plays. Maybe the point was to teach me something?

The bathroom was fortunately empty and I stopped in front of the wide rectangular mirror, carefully putting my bag down next to the sink and opening it up to dig out a hairbrush to start taming my hair. I hated my curly hair and how it sat on my head, moving in spiral-like curls to reach just below my chin. It was thick and difficult to work with, my deep brown eyes straining in concentration to try and brush out the midnight black curls into something that looked better than it was. I knew it was a hopeless task but I tried anyway, subtly adjusting the Kazekoshi's uniform shirt over my chest. The pink stripe was a nice touch at least. The thought had me smile a little bit, but looking myself in the mirror it looked awkward.

Mid-way through brushing my hair out the door opened as a chattering pair entered the clean bathroom and I flinched a little, though neither of them even looked my way. The relief I felt was immense, tending to my hair until it looked straighter and cleaner than before, though still curling at the ends and around the crown of my head. Damn it all. Throwing it back in my bag I quickly headed out to the clubroom.

Today was another set of internal tournament matches that everyone had to participate in, managed by the coach. Kazekoshi's points system was strict but also fair in a way. With over 80 club members, the coach Takako chose regular players for tournaments by having small tournaments every two weeks and recording the points of every match played in the club. To be a regular, you had to be in the top 5 of 80 or more people. It was brutal but the points didn't lie, though I'd seen plenty of people who'd said the opposite about how unfair the system was. Today would be another one of those days.

Last I checked, my club ranking was in the 30s somewhere.

There was a buzz of commotion outside the clubroom as students eagerly paced and lingered around the area, identical among their school uniforms, though anyone could see Fujiki, Ikeda and the other three regulars standing apart from the crowd. Though today was a day where a student could climb their rank and claim a regular's seat, a regular could also lose their seat. Everyone was taking this seriously.

"Aki."

"Masumi?" I turned my head, noticing my classmate walking towards me and felt myself smiling. Masumi Asai was a good friend who sat with me in most of our classes together, quite a short girl who I ended up looming over by sheer accident. She was happy and cheerful but in a genuinely gentle way unlike Ikeda yesterday and I had to hold back a laugh as I noticed she was nervously taking a small comb through her short-cropped brown hair.

"Today's a big day, you ready?" she wondered, smiling up at me but then lowering her gaze, the smile fading somewhat as she brushed the dainty comb through her hair. I quietly lamented, wondering what it was like having such delicate, straight hair that she could use a comb the thickness of a toothpick to keep in check.

"Yes, I think so. I've gotten the hang of the defensive style the coach taught us so…"

"You won't go up in ranking like that," I reminded and Masumi just meekly nodded her head, looking nervous. Suddenly I felt quite boorish and wrong for ever feeling worried about my club ranking in the first place, Masumi was clearly worse-off.

"Here, let me help you," I said, stepping forward to take the dainty comb off Masumi's hands and glide it through her hair. As clean and soft as silk. I quietly swallowed a lump of jealousy down, noticing how Masumi relaxed and even looked relieved to have the job taken off her.

"Thanks, Aki," she breathed as I brushed her hair out.

"Worried?" I asked despite knowing the answer.

"Yeah… There's only a couple months until the spring tournament."

"Don't be. There's no rush, we're not even second-years yet."

"But Aki," Masumi complained with a note of a whine. "Don't you want to be a regular?"

"Well, yeah," I admitted because it was true. Everyone wanted to be a regular in Kazekoshi's Girl's High School mahjong club. "But with my point totals? I need to get a lot better."

Masumi just breathed, whether she was sighing at me or huffing from stress was hard to tell. It was amazing how competitive mahjong was at this school, I could well imagine the regulars were gearing up to fight for their seats.

"So, about that game between you and the regulars…"

I flinched. "Oh."

"Why'd they invite you to the table? The whole club's talking about it."

"I don't know," I admitted. "It's just- They're weird." I could've sworn I heard Masumi snicker in amusement and thankfully she didn't probe me anymore on the topic.

Just as I finished brushing Masumi's hair, with doors to the club still not open yet, I happened to lift my gaze and notice that Fujiki Mihoko was staring right at me. I froze like a deer in the headlights.

"Aki? What's wrong?"

"Uh? Oh, uh. Nothing," I mumbled, quickly averting my gaze from the third-year and captain to make a forced smile at Masumi, who just stared back at me.

"Are you sure?"

"Mmm. Yeah, let's do our best in there."

"... Yeah," Masumi said slowly, casting a look to where I was staring at curiously, though whether by luck or design Fujiki had already moved through the crowd to go and speak to another third-year. Without spotting what I was looking at, my classmate looked at me oddly and then packed her comb into her bag. Again, not asking any more questions.

"Well, good luck in there. Get into the 20s today!"

"You too," I muttered.

I ended up in 28th place. Masumi was thrilled, more so because she too had managed to climb the rankings after a long and arduous afternoon of mahjong. My hand was cramping up from all the tiles I'd picked up and put down. Inwardly, as I packed up my bag and left the clubroom to quickly go home, I felt a sense of accomplishment. Being a first-year student in the top 30 of 80 people was a good start, maybe by next year I could be in the top 10 if I worked hard enough.

The rankings had come out just half an hour after all the games had finished and it came as a shock to everyone when one of the regular seats was taken by a second-year student named Fukabori. The former regular, a third-year whose name I didn't know - Her face was something I couldn't easily forget, like someone ripped her heart from her chest and stomped on it. She'd turned and walked right out of the clubroom and Fujiki had ran after her. It was yet another reminder about how competitive Kazekoshi's mahjong club really was.

But now, everything seemed almost peaceful again. Me and Masumi lived in different directions from the school, so we never got to walk home together, which suited me fine. It was great to have some peace on the return home after so much excitement and tears.

My house came just into view after a ten or so minute walk as I passed the grassy fields, the traditional-style Japanese home built out just on the edge of farmland. It was a small one-storey place, rustic, built with a high stone wall surrounding it to mark the land. The majority of the building was wood and tiled rooves with a large sliding panel wall that opened to the gardens and the view beyond of farmland. It wasn't the most impressive of homes or the best-looking but I thought that it was a perfect, quiet little place.

I didn't announce myself as I entered through the front door, not even finished slipping my shoes off before an old and grey-haired face popped around the corner and smiled at me.

"Miu, how was the tournament today?"

"Fine grandma, I climbed six places."

"Congratulations. Come into the kitchen, I'm almost done making soba."

God, I love my grandma.