#side note new guy also thinks every mailman in the world is the same person and theyre just REALLY good at changing appearances

[ittybittybumblebee]

unspoken dispute to settle

[smileyoongle]

Deception (A Kim Namjoon Mafia AU)

Summary: A damsel in distress and a lonely mafia leader. Different but not too different. The two worlds collide on a rainy night when Kim Namjoon, a renowned Mafia leader is called for an emergency and Y/N Y/L/N is on the run from her abusive father. Feelings stir and he rescues her. But one of them is a liar. And the other's life is on the line. It's only a matter of time until all secrets are out in the open.

Will love be born? Or will death conquer?

chαptєr ƒ⊕ur: Missed Me?

Character Count: 9266

Pairing: Namjoon×Reader (Appearances by the whole of BTS)

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And all I loved, I loved alone.

- Edgar Allan Poe

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Do you think it'll be okay to go to his house?" Hoseok voiced, giving concerned glances to all the members. It had been two days and Namjoon had not interacted much with anyone. His phone calls were always short and abrupt, ending with him saying 'I am busy. I'll call you later.'

Hana stood near the window, staring outside at the bright sky while watching all the members through their reflection on the clean window.

"Why not? You guys have known each other for so long." She stated, turning around with a confused frown.

Yoongi sighed and rubbed his eyes. He felt utterly ridiculous with all the thinking he had done. Too many things were happening all at once.

"The last time we saw him, he seemed a little distracted. I think there's something on his mind." Jin said, narrowing his eyes and staring at the ceiling. It was true. In all the years that the gang had spent together, this was the first time that Namjoon seemed so out of it.

"Maybe you should just tell him that you found me. He'll definitely come, right?"

Yoongi gritted his teeth and gave her a glare. He didn't know why he felt so uncomfortable around her. He just knew that she wasn't the same. She had become tougher and.... selfish.

"We're not gonna do that. Especially since you won't tell us where you were all this time." He said coldly.

Everybody nodded in agreement while Hana sighed and shook her head.

"I just....I think he should be the first one to know." She replied, her voice strained. Jungkook clenched his fists and looked at her. After everything that he had done for her, this is what she had to say?

He stood up and walked towards her, watching as she gulped and took a step back.

"Why? Because none of us suffered? Because none of us blamed ourselves for your death?!"

Jungkook looked like he was ready to pounce on her but his anger was justifiable. Since the past two days, everyone had been trying to ask Hana where she was and what she was doing, only to get the same response.

'I won't say unless Joon comes here.'

Jungkook was the most effected but he tried to understand. Of course, Namjoon had known Hana for longer but that doesn't mean her bond with Jungkook was less special. Hana was the first woman Jungkook cared about, he saw her as his older sister and swore to protect her. After her supposed death, he had taken the longest time to recover. He was the one who didn't give up when everyone else was trying to move on.

Yoongi stood up and placed a hand on Jungkook's shoulder, giving it a comforting squeeze. With a disappointed shake of his head, Jungkook stormed out of the gang's house, Hoseok following him right after.

With a sigh, Yoongi turned his attention to Hana, feeling satisfied on seeing the guilty look that she sported.

"We all searched day and night for you, Hana. I hope you know that."

With that, Yoongi left the room, preparing to call Namjoon again.

∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆

You flicked through the channels on the TV, sighing in annoyance when you couldn't find anything worth watching. Namjoon was currently talking to someone on the phone. You guessed it was business stuff cause he looked a little frustrated.

The last two days, Namjoon had spent a lot of time with you. You got to know him more and you would be lying if you said you didn't like his company. He was a gentleman in every way possible. And you remembered every single conversation that you had with him. Why? Cause it was the first time that you had a normal conversation with someone.

Cause he was worth remembering.

You switched off the TV and turned your attention to the window, admiring the expanse of greenery that covered Namjoon's house. Now that you thought about it, his house was a little too isolated. Also, you didn't see anyone around the area. No mailman. No newspaper guy. No girl scouts. Nothing.

It was the house. Maybe Namjoon was just fond of peace and quiet, you figured. Or maybe he just wanted to avoid the cameras. Cameras that'd watch over him like a hawk only to give rise to a number of scandals which never really happened.

He was a businessman after all.

You turned your head away from the window when you felt the couch dipping beside you. You smiled at Namjoon warmly, making his heart flutter.

"What were you thinking?" He asked, leaning his head on the back of the couch as he faced you. You shrugged in response and busied yourself with your fingers.

"Just...things."

"A penny for your thoughts."

You bit your lip, not looking up at him. Because you knew what would happen if you looked at his eyes. Your heart would jump out of your chest and you'd melt under his gaze. You hated that feeling.

Clearing your throat, you sat up straighter.

"I wanna work." You confessed, slowly looking at Namjoon to note his reaction. He raised his eyebrows at you in question.

"I mean I can atleast get a part time job, right?" You asked, clenching the hem of your shirt tightly. Namjoon opened his mouth to say something but ended up pursing his lips.

After a minute of silence, Namjoon chuckled nervously.

"Why-why do you wanna work?"

The problem wasn't with you working. The problem was that someday someone would find out that you were living with him. They could hurt you just to get to him. And even though he shouldn't feel so protective over you, he couldn't help himself.

"I never had a chance to live life like a normal person, you know. Going to work, hanging out with friends, going on dates....I had none of it." You explained, looking at the floor with a sad smile.

Namjoon felt his heart sink. If it were upto him, he'd give you everything in a heartbeat. He didn't like the idea of you going on dates but he had to suck it up.

Suddenly, his eyes lit up as an idea came to his mind.

Date.

"You wanna go out for dinner tonight?"

Your eyes widened and you looked at him in surprise.

"Me?" You asked, pointing at yourself. Namjoon chuckled in response and nodded. You turned your eyes away as you tucked a piece of hair behind your ear. You were hesitant. Of course, you had warmed up to Namjoon in the past couple of days but this was new to you.

If anything, you were probably the most socially awkward person on the planet, blame it on the lack of communication you had with the outside world. You felt your chest tighten when you thought about your life before Namjoon. You needed a fresh start.

"I'd like that." You muttered.

Namjoon was on cloud nine. Even if it was just a friendly dinner, it was a start. He was determined to get you to warm up to him. He couldn't tell how serious his infatuation with you was, but he knew that you were a ray of hope. You were a sign that he could live life normally. He could pretend that he wasn't a mafia leader with you. He could keep you safe with him and he could make his own small world within the boundaries of his house. Only if it was that simple.

∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆

Namjoon tugged at the jacket, brushing off the nonexistent dust from it. He sighed in content on seeing his appearance. This had to be a good night.

He was surprised at how he had changed in just a matter of three days. He never cared about his appearance, never thought about how he looked but now he was happily spending an hour in his closet, deciding what would make him look good and what wouldn't.

He left his room, patiently pacing in the living room as he waited for you to get ready. Namjoon felt giddy and anxious, his emotions getting the best of him. While he was busy, glancing at your door, he didn't notice the incoming call on his phone. Yoongi's name flashed across the screen but there wasn't any ringing. Just because Namjoon had decided to put it on silent.

After what seemed like hours to Namjoon, the door to your bedroom opened and you descended down the stairs, biting your lip and fiddling with the lace on your dress. Namjoon's heart skipped a beat. The baby blue dress made you look like an angel and he absolutely loved it.

You stood in front of him and smiled, thinking of things to say to lighten the atmosphere. But the doorbell beat you to it.

You and Namjoon glanced at the door. You were beyond surprised since no one ever came to Namjoon's house. This was a first.

Namjoon unlocked the door, frowning in confusion because no one really knew where he lived. Except for the rest of the gang of course.

But the minute he opened the door and saw who stood on the other side of it, he stopped breathing.

"Hana..." He whispered, not being able to believe that his best friend was really back. His eyes turned glossy and he couldn't move anymore. Not even when Hana threw her arms around his neck and cried into his chest.

Whereas you. You didn't even know how to feel. A number of emotions flooded you but you stood there gawking as the strange girl hugged Namjoon while crying. Judging by how Namjoon's arms slowly wrapped around her waist, you could tell they were close.

You slowly backed up the stairs, concluding that maybe it was best to leave them alone. You closed the door of your bedroom just as Yoongi entered the house, followed by the rest. They all sympathetically glanced at the affectionate exchange, keeping quiet even though they had a thousand questions in their mind.

You sat on the edge of your bed, knowing that there was gonna be no dinner tonight. That's not what you cared about actually. For some reason, you couldn't shake off the uneasy feeling that engulfed you after watching that girl hug Namjoon. You felt really betrayed. But you had no right to.

Namjoon probably knew that girl for a long time whereas you, you just came into his life. You lay on the bed, letting your thoughts consume you even though you knew it wasn't good for you. These thoughts would lead to dangerous nightmares later and your sleep schedule would be completely messed up.

You heard the front door shut followed by complete silence. Everyone had probably left, including Namjoon.

You sighed and closed your eyes, falling asleep with the image of his eyes gazing into yours.

∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∆

Everything was long forgotten as Namjoon sat in the gang's house, waiting for Hana to begin her story. He still wasn't sure how he felt after seeing Hana alive, but he knew that he was grateful for it. The agony of being reminded every day about his best friend's death had finally come to an end, although Namjoon would have appreciated it if it would have been sooner.

"So, care to tell us where you had been all this time?"

Taglist: @uwunamjoon @shadowstark @addy-nerd @tzuyyyuuu @stressedinmedschool247 @ifellinluvwithdorks @min-t-posts @floofwrites @pretty-in-pink-just-because @bts-d-onut @fangirllbookworm @mystical-writer @it-is-dana @ximaginx @kpopgirlbtssvt @pearylove @wtfkimbab @anothermisspark

Tell me if you wanna be added to the taglist! Hope y'all enjoyed this part..!

-XX

[theconservativebrief]

Who among us can resist getting a little verklempt upon hearing the strains of some familiar Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood song? Hum with me:

It’s such a good feeling to know you’re alive It’s such a happy feeling, you’re growing inside And when you wake up ready to say, “I think I’ll make a snappy new day!”

Generations of American children now have grown up watching Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, in part because it runs on public television, something that Fred Rogers himself was instrumental in saving. Somewhere between a playmate, an affable uncle or grandpa, and a fairy godfather, Rogers’s slow and compassionate approach to children’s television ran counter to what we typically expect of TV shows for kids; there are no bright, flashy, fast-moving cartoons or slapstick humor in his neighborhood, just simple, direct conversation and storytelling. You got the feeling he cared.

Those same qualities might seem to disqualify Rogers from being a very good subject for a documentary, unless it’s the kind that “exposes” a public figure. But Morgan Neville’s documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor tackles him anyway, and comes to the benign conclusion that Fred Rogers was, in fact, the guy he appeared to be. It’s a gentle film that doesn’t take a lot of risks but doesn’t really need to. Fred Rogers was a kind and gentle man who saw children as important, his work as ministry, and kindness as essential to human existence.

So the main goal of Won’t You Be My Neighbor is to convince us that while kindness and empathy are in short supply today, it need not be that way. Through interviews with Rogers’s close collaborators and friends (his wife, several performers, and the head of the Fred Rogers Center), archival footage (some of it rare), and interstitial animated segments, the film builds out a portrait of a man who saw in the new technology of television an opportunity to communicate with a generation of children and tell them that they were special just the way they were.

And in 2018, that makes him a subversive figure.

The film opens with black-and-white footage of Fred Rogers in 1967, playing a piano and then using a musical metaphor to explain, in the familiar gentle cadence that somehow never comes off as patronizing, that one of his jobs is “to help children through the modulations of life.” What he means is helping children figure out how to express and regulate their emotions during exciting, scary, and confusing moments they encounter in life: dealing with bullies, experiencing parents’ divorce, feeling uncertain about the future, and going through frightening world events.

David Newell and Fred Rogers in Won’t You Be My Neighbor. Focus Features

That last one — the world events that children in the late 1960s and onward have had a greater awareness of, in part due to the very medium Rogers worked in — is a key part of Won’t You Be My Neighbor. Neville (Best of Enemies, 20 Feet from Stardom) is less interested in giving us a straightforward cradle-to-grave account of Rogers’s life than in making an argument around his subject. That argument is that Fred Rogers’s worldview, a kind of humanism that had roots in Rogers’s Christianity but expressed itself as a commitment to everyone’s dignity, is what helped many navigate the scariest events of childhood (RFK’s assassination, the Columbia shuttle explosion). And the power of that worldview, the film suggests, doesn’t stop when childhood ends.

The film is structured around those big world events. The first episodes of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood aired in 1968, amid heated political debates about borders and wars. On the show, King Friday (the stern monarch of the Land of Make-Believe) erected a border fence of his own around his castle, and was convinced to take it down only by messages of goodwill and peace that other characters (both puppet and human) floated over the fence.

The parallels are almost too obvious (a border wall in the first week, 50 years ago?), but this really was the way the show started, and the film carefully shows how Rogers went on to gently and subtly address other cultural battles. In one segment that aired during pitched battles about integration, he soaks his feet in a small wading pool outside his home, then invites the black mailman to cool his feet in the pool with him. Today, a shot of the two men’s feet in the same pool may register as little more than a nice image, but Won’t You Be My Neighbor splices the show’s footage together with images from that time of black children being chased out of a public pool. Rogers knew what he was doing.

Sections like this are the strongest in the movie, straightforwardly told with historical footage to contextualize the Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood segments and to remind us what it was like, as children, to see an assassination or explosion on TV and wonder what it meant for the future. Rogers’s commitment to addressing these events is framed as stemming from two things: his Christian faith (he was an ordained Presbyterian minister, and many interviewees talk about how he saw the show as “ministry”) and his deep interest in child psychology. Those two things led him to believe that children’s emotions were important to address and talk through, and he spent his life doing just that.

“The space between the TV screen and whoever is watching is ‘very holy ground,’” Rogers says in archival footage at one point.

What’s so striking about Won’t You Be My Neighbor isn’t really onscreen, though. It’s the effect the film has on the audience, and what that reveals about us.

As a number of critics have noted, what’s so startling about the movie is the revelation that Mr. Rogers was, as far as anyone seems to be able to tell, basically the person he presented himself to be onscreen. And more importantly, that’s unexpected. Watching the film, it’s hard to believe it’s true. Even after seeing the film, it seems a bit suspect, as if a story of a hidden crime will eventually come to light if we just wait long enough.

That we expect this so keenly (and fear it just as sharply) tells you almost everything you need to know about the times we live in. And it’s reflective of a conversation that many women have been having during the era of #MeToo — making lists in private conversations of the men we know or respect whom we’d be shocked and genuinely devastated to discover were predators. They’re very short lists.

If as a nation we were to make one of those lists, Fred Rogers would almost certainly be on it. The man who told us through the TV every day when we were children about our own worth, about feeling our emotions and then learning to control them, about living in harmony with other people — we need that man.

Thankfully, what Won’t You Be My Neighbor turns up is just that man, and a crowd of people who loved him. That’s probably why just watching the trailer of the film can induce weeping: It’s jarring to realize how much his simple message still makes sense, and how little it is evident in our public life.

And maybe most uncomfortably, the film surfaces why. There’s a clip near the end of the film in which a talking head on Fox News decries Rogers and the “narcissistic society he gave birth to.” I briefly expected the audience at my screening to riot, because it was such a plainly stupid response to what we’d just seen.

Fred Rogers believed in radical kindness. Focus Features

But it’s also a good example of the confusion that marks public discourse today, in which kindness far too often is decried as weakness, courtesy as political correctness run amok, respect as pandering, and the belief in each individual’s dignity and worth as narcissism. These things can all go in toxic directions, of course. But it seems clear that ordinary, old-fashioned goodness has gone out of fashion.

Rogers, the film proposes, was interested in “making goodness attractive in this next millennium,” as he says in a PBS segment recorded late in his life. The idea that everyone has inherent dignity was obvious to him; if you say otherwise, for him, “you might as well go against the fundamentals of Christianity.”

After all, Jesus’s answer to someone who asked him “Who is my neighbor?” was to tell the story of the Good Samaritan, a parable in which the most “righteous” and powerful members of his own society passed by a man lying in a ditch on the side of the road. Who finally rescues him and cares for him? A Samaritan — the people whom Jesus’s listeners considered to be less worthy of dignity and respect than themselves. There’s no chance that Fred Rogers, an ordained Presbyterian minister, didn’t have this story in mind when he structured his entire show around the concept of neighbors.

And you can’t miss the parallels to today. Rogers was against the fast-paced children’s programming of his time that, as he saw it, found most of its humor in denigrating its characters’ dignity via pratfalls and cartoonish violence; it’s an easy line from that to the loud and shallow form that cable news uses to get its adult viewers addicted. Similarly, his slow, self-effacing, and deliberate way of speaking, with a gaze that made his audience certain he was paying attention only to them, is in stark contrast to all kinds of public figures today, not least the one leading our country.

So while Won’t You Be My Neighbor isn’t a particularly inventive film as a piece of cinema — its choices are expected, and we’re still left with questions about how Rogers’s work shaped his own life — that may in the end be for the best. The film succeeds on the radically subversive and obvious notions we learned when we were children: that being nice is not a weakness; that speaking with care is a thing we do simply because we believe the person we’re talking to is a human being with worth and dignity. What’s most startling about Won’t You Be My Neighbor, and what makes it feel almost elegiac, is how very jarring that message feels.

Won’t You Be My Neighbor opens in limited cities on June 8 and will expand over the following weeks.

Original Source -> The Fred Rogers documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor feels radically subversive

via The Conservative Brief