[FICTION] “Cool Jazz at the Dragonfly Club” by Jeremiah Dutch

Also read “Liner Notes”,
Jeremiah Dutch’s essay
on “Cool Jazz at the Dragonfly Club”.

Late on a Thursday afternoon, at the Yokohama office, Jiro Adachi tapped his feet as softly as a drum brush on the worn industrial carpet to a rhythm in his head. There was a coffee-coloured water stain on the ceiling tile above his desk. It was roughly in the shape of Saitama, his home prefecture. He’d complained about it, but there was no response from higher up. The stain was a growing bruise, and the tile was sagging, little by little, day by day. When it rained, there was even a leak.

How long before the whole damn thing caves in? he wondered.

Most of the time he was giving tours in English at the tyre company’s plant, but a couple of days a week he was called into the office to translate documents, answer emails in English, and do other work they found for him. Today was one of those days.

Unseen, the corporate offices presented a stark contrast to the showroom’s flair. The company spent the real money on R&D. There was nothing to improve the drab little office of his tiny section on the top floor of a twelve-storey concrete building in downtown Yokohama.

At just shy of five feet, seven inches tall, he had enough legroom under his metal desk. The office space was squeezed between two other coworkers and a row of three more, with identical desks opposite them. There were no dividers and no privacy. It was like one big table. At the head was the seventh desk, belonging to the section chief.

There was an unwritten rule that nobody could leave until the old man knocked off for the day. Everyone pretended to be busy and not looking at the clock, distracting themselves any way they could.

At last, the section chief pushed back his chair and stood up, issuing not much more than a grunt to show the day was over. He was a little too much like Jiro’s almost wordless father. It was a good thing that the chief hadn’t decided that everyone had to go out drinking that night. That was when the old drunk didn’t stop talking.

Outside, Jiro took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. The sea breeze near the port wasn’t close enough to blow away the exhaust of traffic rumbling above and below the elevated National Route One, which engulfed the entire block in an ugly shadow. Still, the air was fresher than the office. Kimiko, second most senior in the section, was always cold and forbade anyone from opening a window or turning on the A/C. Jiro endured the stuffy office and overwhelming smell of sake, fermented soybeans, and cigarettes emanating from his section chief and male colleagues. Smoking was mercifully no longer allowed at their desks, but the tobacco stains of their predecessors still yellowed the walls.

The concrete surrounding him outside didn’t offer a better view as he travelled to Yokohama Station. He took the Blue Line home. His train car held many white-collar workers similar to him. Just before his home station, the train stopped. Several heads briefly glanced up from phones, heard “human accident,” then returned to their screens. It was frustrating that the platform to his station was in view, but the train started moving soon enough.

Still, Jiro couldn’t help but wonder, is this the rest of my life, going back and forth to a job I don’t really like?

Although not yet thirty, it was easy to imagine himself drinking too much, distracting himself with his phone and his jazz, until one day he jumped in front of a train as “just another human accident. Nothing out of the ordinary.” “Yes,” they would say he was only “little old Adachi-san,”

The housewives looked at him as if he were an exotic ingredient exported from some far-flung republic.

Walking back from his home station, Jiro just wanted to return to his apartment and be alone. First, he had to do some shopping. At the fourth supermarket, Jiro found what he was looking for: a head of fresh cauliflower, way in back of a pile of half-rotten ones the store had the nerve to display. As usual, he was bargain-hunting in the early evening when the grocery stores marked down their produce. He could’ve given up and bought broccoli; there was an immense pile of it stacked up like the Great Pyramid of Giza, but he wanted cauliflower for the dish he had in mind. Again, he was the only unaccompanied man in the supermarket, except for some of the staff. The housewives looked at him as if he were an exotic ingredient exported from some far-flung republic, something they weren’t prepared to handle, the independent male on their turf.

As soon as he came home to his spotless apartment, Jiro was glad to be on his turf. He yanked off his jacket and tie and started Dexter Gordon on his stereo. Tonight’s menu was spicy pineapple pork. Dexter was on the sax, and Jiro was at the cutting board, dicing up the pork and seasoning it with salt and pepper. Then he cut up an onion, garlic, green peppers and cauliflower, as the Amazing Bud Powell came in with a slick piano riff, attacking the keys. After that, Jiro sautéed the pork, onions, and garlic before he added lemon juice, ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, red miso, and the tomatoes, and let them simmer along with the cauliflower for ten minutes. When his kitchen timer rang, he threw in the pineapple and reset the timer for ten more minutes. At last, he added the green peppers and a pinch of salt.

“How did you get into jazz?” Satoko, his ex-girlfriend, had asked him when they first started dating. This was back when she pretended to be interested.

Jiro said that while his mother was fond of classical music, his father loved jazz. Jiro rediscovered it when he was studying in America. For his father, it was as if the melodies and the soul of the music stood for emotions he couldn’t, or wouldn’t, put into words. However, while he taught Jiro to appreciate Blue Note 1595, he also said, “Men don’t stand in the kitchen.” This was one of the rare times his father said anything at all.

Sometimes Jiro missed Satoko. Mostly he didn’t. He got along very well with her, of course he did. Moving into a smaller apartment and learning to cook for himself allowed him to save a little money, maybe enough to start his own business, and had given him a certain amount of self-respect.

The pineapple pork turned out well, and he made a mental note to add it to “Jiro Adachi’s Personal Cookbook.”

The big secret is, cooking is no big deal, he thought, as he seared the pork, it’s not like mastering English, playing the bass, or changing the engine block on a Honda RX-7. Well, okay, sometimes it is a little tricky, he conceded.

Jazz was made for the night. It passed the lonely hours.

Sometimes Jiro caught a ballgame at Yokohama Stadium, but jazz was made for the night. It passed the lonely hours. Leaving work after his last company tour the next day, Jiro weighed seeing a game or going to his favourite club versus his bank balance. Music won out.

It just might clear my head, he reasoned. And I don’t get around much anymore, anyway.

Jiro’s regular club, The Dragonfly, was in the Bashamichi neighbourhood of Yokohama, a maze of backstreets. Jiro thought of it as his secret place. It made him think of the first and last time his father took him and Ichiro to a jazz joint. This was when his brother was in college. It was a place in Takadanobaba, close to Waseda University. His dad never went to college and never cared for the city, which made Jiro wonder what his attraction was to a musical genre popular with an educated urban class. His father talked little about his past, but from what Jiro could piece together, his old man had once worked as a contractor with the US military, and servicemen had taken him to many clubs. If his father had been younger, it would have been only rock and roll. He was old enough to be mistaken for their grandfather.

Jiro and Ichiro were both underage. Jiro was only in junior high, but it was a café during the day and his father could get them in.

“If they promised to behave themselves, be quiet, and let the regulars enjoy Frank Morgan,” said the owner.

The old man, as usual, said little, but looking back, it was his attempt to connect with his sons before they both became adults. Jiro loved the music; Ichiro couldn’t have cared less.

The Dragonfly was a hidden basement joint in an alleyway and down a flight of stairs. On the walls as one walked down were framed albums from Dato-san, the owner’s, personal collection, beginning with Cool Struttin’ by Sonny Clark. The shapely legs in pumps on the cover led you down the narrow steps. Overhead John Coltrane gave you a pensive stare, to say nothing of Herbie Hancock’s crossed-armed appraisal of you, and heaven help you if you were a little tipsy on the way out and tried to make sense of the abstraction that was Mingus Ah Um.

Cool jazz was closer to classical, and unlike pop, it didn’t have a shelf life.

When he entered, a few of the regulars gave Jiro a nod, but most were engrossed in the sound. Some were studying it intensely, some were nodding their heads in time, others were off-beat. They were all would-be hepcats, real jazz otakus, like Jiro, cosplaying in fedoras and trench coats, like it was the mid-Showa Era and rowdy and randy US sailors were still in Yokohama and keen to trade Blue Note LPs for beer, cigarettes and what-have-you. Some regulars were older, but the crowd was younger than one might’ve expected. Cool jazz was closer to classical, and unlike pop, it didn’t have a shelf life. Kids could dig it if they tried. It reminded Jiro of how much it was like the rhythm of English speech. It swung. Just when you think you’ve lost the line of the melody, it would drift into a familiar refrain.

He took a seat near the bar and settled in. The Salt of the Earth, the house band, reminded him a bit of the Dave Brubeck Quartet; only their leader didn’t tickle the ivories. Nor did he blow a horn.

It’s just as well because his slightly crooked teeth might’ve affected his embouchure, Jiro thought. But maybe that’s just jealousy talking.

Despite, or maybe because of, its imperfections, the leader’s smile held a charm over the ladies, and there were women fans. Or maybe he drew them in. Oh, how they swooned over his dimples and long hair, kept out of his way by a Scully cap he wore backwards. His axe was the upright bass, and he led the band through a tight and simpatico set, syncopated with every improvisation. As they started “Blue Rondo à la Turk” Jiro was sure they practised for countless hours to make it look as easy as play. Somehow, the quartet transcended the poor acoustics of the club, noise from the street, a slightly out-of-tune baby grand, chairs scraping on the floor, a busy bar, and the disinterest of some of the audience, though certainly not the regulars.

The club was never Satoko’s scene. The band’s mastery of the 8/9 time signature, which sent a warm shiver from his shoulders to his arms, had no effect on her. Not everyone could dig instrumental jazz. Many people needed a singer and lyrics. Satoko was that way. Jiro realised he was a selfish snob. She had her J-Pop and didn’t need his lectures on the genius of Paul Desmond, Joe Morello, Dexter Gordon, and Sonny Rollins.

After the first set, Jiro talked to Dato-san, the last of the beatniks. He was also the bartender. There was a small, unused kitchen. Jiro knew Dato-san casually, but was friendly enough with him to ask why they didn’t serve any food besides edamame beans and peanuts.

“I’m getting too old to do everything myself. I’d hire a chef if I could afford one,” he explained, flicking his white ponytail off his shoulder and adjusting his bifocals.

Then, in a lower voice, he said he was thinking of selling the place.

“It’s getting too tough to run,” Dato said.

“That would be a shame,” Jiro said.

Dato shrugged. “Everything must pass.”

Jiro was the first to enter the office on the third Friday. Something looked amiss even before he turned on the lights and hung up his coat. To begin with, there was the yellow puddle, as if some large dog had relieved itself by his desk. Then there were the remains of the sagging ceiling tile that had finally snapped and fallen on his chair and blotter pad. He retrieved a dustpan, broom, mop, and bucket from the closet and cleaned up his work area. Jiro only noticed that there was still a leak just as his coworkers were coming in. Kimiko was really sorry about what happened. The section chief was really sorry about what happened. Everyone was really sorry about what happened, but something had to give. Jiro thought it just might be the right time to talk to Dato-san about his asking price for The Dragonfly.

Also read “Liner Notes”, Jeremiah Dutch’s essay on “Cool Jazz at the Dragonfly Club”.

^{How to cite: Dutch, Jeremiah. “Cool Jazz at the Dragonfly Club.” Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, 7 Jul. 2026, chajournal.com/2026/07/07/dragonfly-club.}

As an American who has called Japan home for over 25 years, Jeremiah Dutch’s writing crosses both cultures. He’s written about such diverse topics as horror films and climbing Mt. Fuji. While still an undergraduate, he wrote for The Haverhill (Massachusetts) Gazette and The Portsmouth (New Hampshire) Herald. In 1997, he graduated from the University of New Hampshire and moved to Japan to teach English the following year. In 2007 he earned a MS.Ed in Education from Temple University and for over seventeen years taught at the post-secondary level while continuing to write academic articles, fiction, and non-fiction. He currently teaches at Rikkyo University.  In 2022, his short piece, Zen Failure in Kyoto won an Honourable Mention in the Seventh Annual Writers in Kyoto Competition. This was excerpted and adapted from his then novel-in-progress, Gaijin House. Another adapted excerpt was published this year under the name “Transported Souls in the Motel of Regret” in the anthology Mono no Aware: Stories on the Fleeting Nature of Beauty. These days he calls Yokohama home and lives there with his wife and two daughters. When not writing, teaching, or spending time with his family, he enjoys reading, exercising, and following baseball. Some more information about Jeremiah and his writing can be found on his website and Instagram. [All contributions by Jeremiah Dutch.]