The policemen charged into the South Tower of the Senior Center in Boca Raton and confiscated the incriminating purses lying open on the tables. They swept quarters, dimes and nickels into plastic baggies and told the old women to go home.

        “Section 849.085 of the Florida Statutes prohibits gambling in a public arena. Pack it in, ladies,” said the Marine-like officer.

        Mavis Gruber stood, all fiery five feet-two inches, every hair on her chin alert. “We’re playing penny-ante Mah Jongg. You can’t tell me that’s a crime.”

        The officer hefted the bags of coins. “There’s more than pennies here, Ma’am.”

        “Don’t Ma’am us,” said Gertrude Friedman, her lips turned so low, her bottom teeth did the talking.

        “This is bull crap,” hissed Mavis.          

        “I’m sorry, Ladies, but there’s been a complaint and until it’s cleared up, you can’t play here.”

        Leers and grumbles bounced through the common room. “Big shots. Knuckers. Picking on little old ladies. Mashugannas! Idiots. My lawyer son will hear about this. He’ll put YOU in jail.” But the women gathered up their racks and tiles, and put away their Mah Jongg sets. “We’ll play at my house. The cops can’t bother us there.” The women broke into groups of four, shuffled off with their walkers and canes, their voices heightening to maximum pitch and their eyes on fire.

        None of the departing women had asked Mavis or Gertrude to join them.         

        Gertrude was the kvetch. Grousing about everyone and everything. “Hurry up. You’re taking all day to play one tile!”;“Talk louder! My left ear is full of wax.”;“Your hand is dead. D - E - A - D.” At sixty-eight, she had no respect for slow players, mumbling players, dumb players, or anyone who didn’t show enough respect for the game of Mah Jongg.

        The other woman, Mavis, was a hussy, with tattoos and yellow hair and a mouth like a sewer, at seventy-eight. Loud and crude. Always slamming down the tiles, like they were bullets. She won too much and gloated about it. “Such schlemiels, like taking candy from babies,” she’d crow as she pocketed her winnings.

        As the other women filed out, the clubhouse grew quiet–no click-clacking of Mah Jongg tiles, no griping or table-slapping. Mavis and Gertrude sized each other up from across the room, their eyes slit-snide.

         At a game table near the door, Blooma Gottlieb, a tiny eighty-three year old granny, huddled low in her chair, looking lost. She held a tray of cookies, none of them eaten and wondered what ingredient she had forgotten this time.

        Near the wall of windows, Winnie Reichman, a slender straight-backed woman of seventy-two, tried to get reception on her cell phone. Her face was stone-cold, her lips thin and tight. She gave up on the signal and tapped a text instead, like she was on a sinking ship and this message was the last she’d ever make.  

        The four females who remained in the room squared off in the four corners. None invited the other to her house to play.

****

A few Wednesdays later, a note hung from the door at the South Tower Senior Center:

Mah Jongg games may resume as long as the total winnings of any player do not exceed $10. Statute 949.085, penny-ante game restrictions will be strictly enforced.

                                                              - Boca Raton Police

        Word spread quickly through the village, but the South Tower game room had already been replaced by the North Tower game room which had two unisex bathrooms with four stalls, and a kitchenette. There were five playing tables, well-spaced and covered with sound-muting cloths.

        But not every Mah Jongg woman got the message.

        Mavis revved up to the familiar South Tower clubhouse in her pink Harley-Davidson Sportster eager to get back to the game. She was a savvy player, quick to call a tile and hated when anyone played slow. “Stop schlepping along already,” she’d sneer. But the day was bright and she was early. She sat on the large soft saddle of her beloved motorcycle and lit her stogie. Maybe a little schnapps before she took their money. She’d been known to walk away with thirty bucks, wiping out everyone at her table. Now there was a limit of $10. Feh! It wasn’t about the money, she thought. But how she loved taking those alta kaker biddies for a ride. She swigged from a silver flask and stared into the mid-day sun. She’d just hang there a few more minutes. Let the prune-faced blue hairs get their shit together.

****

        Blooma was seated inside the clubhouse, having arrived at noon, even though the game started at one. She was afraid of being late. She dug into her pocketbook for her Mah Jongg card, but it wasn’t there. Neither was her purse of nickels and dimes and quarters. Oy gevult, she sighed. She must have left them in her condo. She hobbled out the rear entrance and rushed home, her short bow-legs doing the best they could. She gulped deep breaths when she got to her door, but she couldn’t open it. Where were those fashtunkena keys? She dumped everything onto the walkway. Her wallet. Her pills. Her eyedrops. Her Vaseline. Tissues and more tissues. Sweet N’ Low. Luden’s cherry cough drops. Her cell phone, off of course. She shouldn’t waste the batteries. Pens. A pad of paper with scribbled lists. A crusty dinner roll in a crumpled napkin. Her Saint Anthony prayer card. That sweet shiksa nurse had given it to her after Blooma said she misplaced her contact information. Saint Anthony, the finder of lost items. Like her mind, Blooma thought. But forgetting her contact info had been intentional, emes, the truth. Ah, finally, her Mah Jongg card. And her keys. Now what else had she forgotten? The babke on the counter. She hoped she hadn’t substituted salt for sugar this time.

****

        In the Palace Suite section of Sunrise Village, Winnie paced her penthouse apartment listening for her driver Sal to buzz the intercom. Her long legs made short work of the space even if her home had three thousand square feet. The Mah Jongg game would begin without her if he didn’t get there soon and she’d have to sit out four rounds before she’d have a turn. Like a peasant on the sidelines. Where the blazes was he? It was already one o’clock. She took the elevator downstairs, her shellacked red fingernails tapping the wall like a drumbeat. The Lincoln Town Car was at the corner. Sal leaned against it smoking a Camel, jabbering into his cell.

        He held it away from his ear when he saw her. “Where to now?” he snarled.

        “The Clubhouse!” She wanted to add ‘you surly moron,’ but she didn’t drive and Sal was part of her inheritance from her late husband, may he rest in peace.

        “I thought you ladies were expelled from playing there.” A smirk slid over his lips; Winnie wanted to slap it away.

        She felt personally responsible for reopening the senior center. “I’ll have you know, I wrote a scathing editorial in the Sun Times telling how we don’t wager our jewelry or our Cadillacs. We play for nickels and dimes.” Winnie straightened her shoulders; her chin shot up high. “Then I called the Boca Raton Chief of Police and gave him an earful. He had no right closing us down. I told him we’d file a class action suit against him personally if he didn’t reopen the building for our Mah Jongg game.”

        “Well, good for you.” Sal swept open the rear door of the Lincoln Town Car with a flourish of his arm and an exaggerated bow from the waist. “It is my unrequited privilege to take you wherever you’d like to go.”        

        Winnie heard his snicker, but ignored it.

****

        Pedaling her three wheeler to the South Tower clubhouse, Gertrude’s spandex was too tight. Her thighs rubbed. Her back hurt. She hated the flab around her midsection. She’d always been so proud of her trim figure, but since turning sixty, everything she ate padded her belly, hips and thighs. She looked like a pregnant woman when she turned sideways. She never regretted not having a child, never mind never having a husband, never mind rarely having sex.

        Hot-breathed and sweating, Gertrude arrived at the clubhouse. Without pausing to look around, she ran into the bathroom and stripped off her underwear, stuffing it in her purse. Ah, she could breathe. She knew what would really cure her, a good shtupping, something that hadn’t happened since she was fifty, almost twenty years ago. No man was good enough. But Jesus, she was horny. Playing that stupid game always calmed her down. She’d had a scare last month when the police raided them, fearing she wouldn’t have her regular Wednesday game. And what was that about? Gambling? For quarters! Such mishegas! Foolishness. She wrote a letter to the Condominium Board––a good long letter detailing how every woman in the village had a pension or social security or enough money from their dead husband’s insurance. None of them played to gamble. It was a social game. Period.

        When a reporter caught wind of the hubbub, he took her photograph and put the entire story in the Sun Times. “Jewish Bubbes Busted for Gambling.” She was quoted right there on page one: “Ridiculous,” said Gertrude Friedman, “we’ve been treated like criminals, not upstanding, respected tax-payers. Besides, playing Mah Jongg is good for our brains.”

        Gertrude felt like a celebrity with her picture front and center in the newspaper. It was about time she received positive attention. With her body swinging loose, Gertrude swaggered into the common room. The seats were neat around their tables and not one woman complimented her on the story or scowled or gave her dirty looks. No one was there.

        “Where is everybody?” asked an out-of-breath voice from the doorway. “Oy gevult! I thought I was late!” Blooma set the cinnamon bread on the counter.

        Gertrude recognized the old lady who brought pastry each week and who smiled even if she lost every game. “It’s Wednesday. Where the hell are they all?”

        Blooma shrugged. “I’ve got my card! Do you have a Mah Jongg set? I never bring one.”

        “I got a set,” said a smoker’s voice, deep and throaty. Mavis strutted in like a cowgirl, smelling like poker games and saloons.

         Gertrude pursed her lips and her face grew dark, her eyes beady and dagger-like. She didn’t like that floozy. She’d be damned if she was going to play with her. “We can’t play three. Might as well go home.”

        Blooma’s eyes welled. “I remember playing three. We can figure it out.”

        Gertrude’s lips flattened, widening her jowls. That old woman can’t figure out how to button her shirt so it’s even. Gertrude wasn’t going to waste another minute in this room.

        The door opened and in strode Winnie, her gold bracelets jangling, her eyes growing larger with each step, surprised that there were only three other women in the room, and weird ones at that. The mean-faced grouser who always complained. The wild one, all duded up like a man, smelling like smoke and whiskey. And the one with the loch in kop, a hole in her head, who put up wrong hands or gave everyone Mah Jongg in the last wall and cost each player double money.

        “Might as well make the most of it,” said Mavis, reaching into her pocket for her flask.

        “Do you want a bissel cake?” asked Blooma. “A little slice?” She regarded Gertrude. “Or a big one?”

        Gertrude made the face her mother warned would freeze like that. She took out a tissue, wiped her forehead then stuffed the wrinkled ball up her sleeve. She decided she would win every game and feel damned good about herself.

        Winnie’s fingernails stabbed into each other like they were arguing. She didn’t want to play with these low-class outcasts. She turned toward the door but saw her driver speed away. Perhaps one round, she thought. She folded her skirt under her skinny rear and sat down, her back straight, her narrow chest heaving.

        Mavis straddled a chair. “Let’s get to it, Ladies.” She snapped open the Mah Jongg case and dumped out its contents.

        With the eagerness of a puppy, Blooma brought out her Mah Jongg card and her baggie of coins. She hurried to sit, as if her chair would disappear if she didn’t claim it.

        “I’ll be East,” Mavis said as she rolled the dice, broke the wall, and dealt the tiles. “Let the games begin.”

        “No talking while we play,” said Gertrude.

        Mavis flipped her the bird and squawked like a parrot.