Date Night

by Tess Mackenzie

Short story (10,955 words)

Lizzie and Eric’s neighbors are having a noisy party, so they decide to go out for the night. At first they don’t have much fun, and aren’t sure what to do, but after a while they remember they are in love, and ought to enjoy just spending time with one another. Soon, they begin to. They have a drink in a bar, and check into a hotel, and slowly rediscover one another.

This is erotica about a couple being with each other, and being themselves, and remembering why they are in love.

Adult content.

42 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 24, 2013

About the author

Hey goodreads! Um, hi. Wave.

So first, thank you to everyone for being interested enough to read this. And the stories. Really, just thank you all heaps for reading what I've written until now, and wanting to read other things, and just for everything, really. I'm really, really grateful to everyone who's interested.

And thank you also to whoever is putting books up here. That's cool, and I really appreciate it!

So what’s going on with my books is a bit weird and kind of confusing, and I just wanted to explain properly so it’s clear.

Basically, everything I write is free to read on my website, or on Wattpad, and usually on Smashwords too, including all the stories in the anthology collection books that are for sale some places.

What happens is I mostly write short stories, and as I write them I put them up those places. Then, after a while, the anthologies collect the existing stories, and bundle them into tidier ebooks and print books.

So the stories in the anthologies are the same ones as are in the individual, single ebooks, and the ebooks can be read free, all over the place, if you’d rather to that.

So this is just to say all that, so no-one doesn’t realize and feels cheated or something. And also, I hope I used enough bold!

The anthologies at the moment are...

Getting Into a Girl's Shorts: Short Sometimes-Erotic Fiction about Women With Women

It Doesn't Always Rain: A Collection of Literary Erotica

Squishy Group Hugs: Collected Smut

...and the book pages at Amazon or wherever say which stories are in where.

So basically, there's no need to pay for anything unless you want to, and there’s nothing unique in the paid books, so don’t go thinking otherwise.

Which all sounds a bit weird right? Everything's free except it isn't?

Basically, while it would be nice to sell billions of books one day, I really also just want people to read what I write, and I also don't want anyone to feel pressured to hand over money, and this is how it ended up. So all a bit Wattpad, and that way of doing things, rather than the more normal print-book kind of model. And also yes, it is basically a devious plan to, um, I don't know, win you over, I guess, and guilt you into one day eventually buying things. But really, really mild guilt, I completely promise. So don't worry if you never end up buying anything. Read all the same!

So anyway. We're all clear on how this works now? Yay!

Um, what else. So just to say this too, really clearly, so I don't accidentally offend someone or something, I WRITE EROTICA so anything near me is potentially rude. Please don't get offended and then upset and then angry. Anger is bad for you and whatnot.

Um, yeah. Sorry to shout.

And I'm not here especially often either, so just to say that in case I haven't found the inbox or something! I'll work it out.

So that's all.

Except, just, thank you for reading what I’ve written until now. It makes a big difference that people are, and I’m starting to get the hang of all this, I think! So thank you.

Reviews

[Robert Cohen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tess knows the difference between sex and love. But when she brings the two together, as she does in this story, it is unspeakably beautiful. Her aging (probably mid-20's) couple use the loud party next door as an excuse to go out on the town, something they haven't done in years. They end up in a hotel for the night, and little by little, they realize how deeply in love they still are, and why. Tess can make you feel the exquisite complexity of a relationship growing richer over time: "She might be getting old, and staying at home too much, but giving each other head meant they were still somehow them, who they'd used to be when they met, that they weren't completely old and dull just yet." That's as eloquent a statement about love as any I've ever read.

Watching the city from the window of her hotel room in the middle of the night, Lizzie thinks, "There was a whole other world out there. A world that looked fun...........but one she was starting to realize she didn't fit into any more. Not really. It wasn't that it was completely alien to her, that it had rejected her and driven her out. It was just that she liked to do other things now, and she hadn't known that before. She didn't mind losing it, she realized." Have you ever read a more beautiful and wistful evocation of the sweetness of ageing?

I don't believe Tess is aware of the power of her unaffected and graceful prose. She writes like Hemingway, only without all the pretentious preening. Tess, if you're reading this, just keep doing what you're doing. It's beautiful.

[Rachel]

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