(A/N: my first RENTfic...hope you enjoy. This first part is a bit angsty, but the rest should be a good mix of comedy and other stuff.)

(DISCLAIMER: I don't own these characters (except Eva), I rent them from Jonathon Larson)

CHAPTER ONE

I never wanted to be a father. I would have been happy to live out my days with nothing but my camera to care for. The idea of shaping the life of another human being is terrifying to me. After all, I apparently didn't do to well with my own or I wouldn't have spent the first half of my adult life as a starving, freezing Bohemian in New York's alphabet city.

But, after Roger died this past November, I didn't have a choice.

Eva Angel Davis was born nine months after that fateful Christmas that brought us all back together again. We could have killed Roger and Mimi for risking the life of an innocent child because of their own carelessness. On June 15th, 1991 a beautiful little girl was brought into this world, and by some sort of miracle, she was completely healthy.

On June 16th, 1991, we lost Mimi. Roger couldn't even look at his daughter for two months. He spent every moment he could at the cemetery, staring at Mimi's headstone. Collins, Maureen, Joanne and I took care of Eva by ourselves until the night we sat Roger down and gave him a wake-up call. He got better with Eva after that. It wasn't long before father and daughter were inseperable.When she was six months old, he bought one of those baby-backpack things and carried her with him everywhere he went. When Eva started to crawl, she followed him everywhere she could. We hadn't been able to afford a crib, so the two of them shared his bed until she was about four or five.

Collins died on October 31st, 1994, exactly 4 years after his beloved Angel. He was buried next to her and Mimi. Maureen and Joanne ended up moving in together in a small house in the suburbs a few months later, and they adopted a little boy from somewhere in Africa and named him Collin. Roger and I still couldn't afford a house, even though we had agreed that we had to get Eva out of New York's east village. We moved to a better neighborhood, and got a different apartment with electricity, heat and running water. It wasn't much, but it was better than Avenue A.

Every year after that, Roger grew weaker. He spent most of Eva's sixth grade year in the hospital, and when he finally came home, he and I knew that he had come home to die. He held on a lot longer than either of us had expected, but passed away on the night of Eva's school's Christmas concert; November 30th, 2003, fifteen years after he had found out he was dying. Maureen, Joanne and I were by his bed; Eva was curled up with him in what was probably the most depressing scene I've ever witnessed. I hadn't even had the heart to take my camera out.

I won't forget the day of his funeral: Eva wouldn't leave the cemetery. The look on her face as she stared at her father's grave mirrored that of Roger's the day Mimi was buried there. She sat next to the pile of fresh dirt and stared at the cold granite headstone that read: Roger A. Davis, loving father, best friend. 1966-2003.

The words were empty. Roger hadn't been a 'loving father'; he had been a playful, caring, understanding and gentle dad. And sure, he had been the best friend anybody could have asked for, but two words on a piece of rock can't sum up more than thirty years' worth of friendship. I think Eva realized that, or maybe she just thought that if she stayed there, she wouldn't have to face the fact that when she did leave to go home, her daddy wasn't coming with her.

I stood off to the side, watching her from beneath that old tree that Roger, Mimi, Joanne, Maureen, Benny, Collins and myself had argued under on that Halloween that seemed like eons ago. I watched her expressionless face as she twirled a single rosebud between her fingers and realized what Roger's death meant to the two of us.

That day changed my life forever. I went from being "Uncle Mark" to being something I hadn't thought of being in my weirdest dreams; a dad. Now, don't get me wrong, I would never in a million years have attempted to take Roger's place in Eva's life, but I knew that from that moment on, I was the one she would come to when she had a problem. I'd be the one to go to parent teacher conferences, show up at choir concerts, school plays, and dance recitals. Oh yes, it was apparent she had already inherited her parents' flair for music and dance. She danced ballet and was an avid band and choir member at her middle school. Already a Bohemian at the tender age of thirteen.

Of course, I had expected to do all of this; I had even expected to be the one to wipe away tears when her first boyfriend broke her heart. But I had never even fathomed having to deal with the one crisis that took place a few weeks before Christmas the year after Roger died.

(So? What do you think? Know what the crisis is yet? The next chapter is quite funny...I promise...R&R!)