Djin

As some of you may know, for the last four years, a group of Téa’s fans donated to UNICEF in honour of her birthday. We donated over $6,000 over the past three years. It has been a momentous accomplishment in Téa’s honour. I’d just like us to donate what we can to UNICEF in her honour to help the children of the world, who are in desperate need of our help. Please considering donating whatever you can…$5, $10, $20, etc, would be more than generous and appreciated. Let’s do what we can to help the world’s children and make Téa’s birthday special, once again.

How this will work is as follows:

You will make your donation HERE. You can also donate to your respected charter of UNICEF. ANYONE CAN DONATE. Wherever you are in the world. (Donations must be made between January 20th, 2019 thorough to February 23rd, 2019)  

Take a screen cap of your thank you message. (I hate to ask for “proof” but I want to make sure people don’t take advantage of being apart of something special.)

Send me a message privately either on Twitter or Tumblr (Tumblr Messenger allows you to send pictures through it, so please use that), along with your name, how much you donated, and a screencap of your confirmation (I don’t need the part with your personal information). The amount you donate will stay between you, me and UNICEF.  

I will keep track of the money donated and on her birthday I will present her (via Twitter/Her SM Team) a message with the TOTAL amount donated along with a list of names/usernames that made those donations.

You have until February 23rd to make your donation.

Please don’t tag Téa in this, I want to surprise her again!

The show is over, but that doesn’t mean the fandom has to be! I’ll be posting a new challenge on the first of every month, and I really hope some of you participate! (I have enough challenges lined up to do this for the next 4 years, so please don’t leave me all alone in this fandom!)

January’s Challenge:  New Beginnings!

The Rules: There are none, EXCEPT that your piece must involve a new beginning of some kind. If you’ve never written a Henry/Elizabeth origin story (or if you’re @2queens1prince and have written 700 of them but want to write another), this is your chance! Or take it in a different direction - write about a new job, a new friend or acquaintance or colleague, a new home, a new goal, a new baby, a new stage in life. I’ve kept it vague on purpose!

I’m calling it January’s challenge, but there’s absolutely no deadline. And no word limit either - make it a drabble or a one-shot, or the longest multi-chapter you’ve ever written. (Please please please make it a multi-chapter? I need new things to read) And whatever new beginning you choose can play as large or as small a part as you like in the piece.

All you have to do is to tag your fic: Madam Secretary Fanfic Challenge.

If you’re looking for inspiration, please check out my Prompts Masterpost!

Bonus Challenge: Feel like setting an additional challenge for yourself? Send me an Ask for a character or a setting or a new beginning to write about!

Henry’s sneakers slapped the concrete of the sidewalk in a steady rhythm, his breath puffing white clouds in the cool air. Leaves crunched beneath his feet, early October in Virginia visible in the vibrant colors falling from the trees. The fall morning was almost unseasonably cold, but Henry welcomed the stark relief from southern humidity on his long training runs. Caught up in his own thoughts, he suddenly noticed a car parked slightly askew at the curb a few yards in front of him. An older model, brilliant cherry red, probably too expensive for the person attached to the jean-clad legs and ratty Converse sticking out from underneath the front bumper. Borrowed by a teenage boy without permission from his parents, undoubtedly, Henry surmised, without much rational basis for his conclusion. Black Chucks, dingy laces spread like an abandoned spider web over black asphalt, worn nearly through the sole on the heels. For reasons Henry later still couldn’t quantify, he stared at those shoes as if they held the key to every mystery of the world’s religions.

“I can’t be with someone who can’t be there for the hard things,” she’d said, crying as she said it. “If I can’t rely on you to stick it out with me, then…”

“Elizabeth–” he’d said, looking terrified as she barrelled on.

“–there’s no point.” It hurt to say. She wondered if anything had ever hurt her so badly since the loss of her parents, and didn’t think so. But if that tragedy had taught her anything, it was how to protect herself. She had to protect herself.

And now two decades have passed and they’re staring at each other from opposite sides of the Sit Room and he looks just as handsome as the day they met, all those years ago in her theology seminar. She still feels the same butterflies, and can’t help but wonder if she’d made the right choice.

After, once everyone in the room begins to disperse, she takes her time putting her files back into her bag. She gives herself time to decide how she wants to proceed. Henry takes the choice out of her hands when he falls into step with her as she makes her exit.

“It’s been a long time,” he says. “You look good.”

“You too, Henry.”

“Can I buy you a coffee?”

This is some I wrote a long time ago. I posted it on FF.net but then decided I didn’t like it, felt like it was too raw. I don’t know what changed to make me post this here but here it is. Rated M for smut.