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I think they meant it
When they said you can't buy love
Now I know you can rent it
A new lease you are, my love,

- I'll cover you, Rent


Notes: Hmm… I started loving HPDM around my highschool days. It's so nice to have fanfiction all around up till now. Very nice.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything around here.


CHAPTER 1: DRIVERS AND THEIR WIVES

So many days that he has spent alone, it was almost welcome… the loneliness. He looked on from the window of a cab. He was helplessly sorry for his state. In time like these, he felt weird intruding on his best friends' house. They were a couple ,finally, after years of shying around each other. He was truly happy for them. It's just that, he wanted a life like that too. A passionate love story, no matter how girly he sounded in his mind. A passion that can withstand pointless and point-ful arguments. Deciding the stay at an unknown Muggle territory, Harry looked on. Looked on to the new environment. Looked on to the new life. Looked on for a future.

A routine day. A boring, boring routine work. Draco pressed reset on the dialysis machine and started putting in the blood lines. He took the saline bottle and let it hang on the pole. He worked monotonously while maintaining a welcoming smile. Masks after masks of unaffected smile, no matter a compliment or insult. The technician tapped him on the shoulder and asked him to move. A nod and the procedure is set up. He plastered another smile and took the patient's arm. Pansy and Blaise, huh? He thought silently as he work. They were mighty tight before, almost the golden trio in their own way. But seriously, he thought he could work it out with Pansy but things were going downhill for a whole 10 years that they tried having a relationship. Very well, he could just find some nice chap while the season's still hitting single. He looked out the unit's window. Looked on to the same, familiar environment. Looked on to the same, same life he sometimes loathe and mostly loved. Looked on, maybe for a change.

Then it happened. A car crash. Peter or was it Geronimo? His wife probably was cheating on her for years now. He knew the moment, he stepped inside the cab that his wife used his livelihood for the extracurricular activities she loved doing outside the house. He fumed and pondered heavily on the lipstick stains on the passenger's head rest. He was terribly, terribly distracted. Oh, his wife. When will he ever learn? A blinding light joined by a loud honking sound was all he remembered before darkness enveloped him. At the back seat, another story was happening. A loud crack in the air vanished both the occupants before a terrific collision happened. Harry sweated profusely at the sudden use of heavy magic and he transported himself and the cabbie to safety.

"Would you mind if I asked for a drop light, love? I'm think I have the chills and the blanket is doing no good.", Madame Rosmerta glanced hopefully to the nurse in duty. She eyed him like a sweet candy, always smiling and having gentle hands.

"No problem, Madame", he replied. As he was getting a blanket near the supply room, the window outside caught his attention. A mop of black hair appeared near the entrance of the hospital, carrying a stout man covered in blood. Squinting for details, Draco pressed his forehead and followed the two as they hurried at the double doors. He figured they were wizards or one of them is. Too visible if they want to mingle within the Muggle world. He shrugged and went back to his patient. At the back of his mind, a boy with a prominent scar and even more prominent messy black hair pushed into his thoughts.

Smelling the sniffling scent of disinfectants all around, the endless beeping of machines and the disorienting crowd of white-cloaked people, Harry calmly panicked in his head. The driver, Peter or was it Geronimo? was as unconscious as a boulder in his arms, to top it all off, he doesn't know if the blood covering both of them were his or the other.

A pretty girl with long dark hair wearing blue scrubs approached him and inquired what happened. Moment later, the savoir of the depressed cabbie was swarmed with doctors and nurses. Asking a hundred questions at the same time and waiting with pleasant calmness. No matter how gruesome and disgusting the scene Harry and G/P presented, they might have seen more like that that their calmness was never disturbed. Some backed away and only a doctor and a nurse remained to get his details. He answered every relevant question and G/P was rolled away via stretcher to some random room. He was assessed and was sent to some room to change clothes and some stitches.

He washed and donned the standard patient's gown and dropped on the nearby bed. The sheets smelled like disinfectants too. He looked around, remembering the time when he would always wake up to the white walls of Hogwart's infirmary. He missed the potion smells sometimes. Muggle hospitals usually used strong acids to remove infections whereas St. Mungo's smelled strongly of firecrackers for the constant use of magic to return people to normal.

After some time with no one disturbing him from the dim room, he pondered everything that happened. Realizing he was temporarily a hobo, with no clothes, no wallet, no form of contact to the others except his drained magic, he stood up with a start. The sudden movement made him dizzy but the truth worked like a pepper-up potion. This couldn't be happening on his very first day outside Wizarding London. He slumped lazily and closed his eyes. If he could cry man-tears, he would, but it would not do any good. He, then decided to amble his thoughts away in the hallway.

Draco got a double shift on his weekly schedule. He didn't mind. The work was not overwhelming and the pay was good. He smiled genuinely at himself for a job well done today. No hematoma on the cannulation and no pulsating blood splashes from the trainees. He changed from his gray scrubs to a casual attire and exited the unit. He wanted some Omurice for dinner topped with a whole bottle of Tabasco…probably apple juice would be good enough and uhhmm... HARRY POTTER?!

He stopped in his tracks as the boy who lived curiously strolled from ER department. The years might have changed his whole appearance but Potter's unbelievably horrendous walk won't. Draco, as you might remember, spent many a year stalking the savior of the wizarding world just to catch him do something illegal or some sort.

'Probably illusions, hallucinations or whatever they call it nowadays', he thoughtfully convinced himself. He walked on, because this way or a long winding hallway outside the maternity clinic would it be. As he hurried, Harry turned his back and because of his clumsy ways, tripped Draco into sprawling with him on the floor. Bright green eyes stared at blue-grey ones registering shock, anger then happiness.

Yes, happiness, dear readers. It was a brilliant, sparkling green that stopped Draco's heart from transforming into a dark, viscous entity. The shadows hurriedly hid away into corners as the smile that erupted from the great hero was purely and sincerely thanking heaven for this man in front of him.

"Malfoy!" a voice that spoke volumes of gladness that dispelled an unfortunate destiny woken Draco from his stunned state.

"Potter," he replied evenly. As evenly as their position was concerned.

"I'm so glad that you are here!" Harry shook his head and aimed to stand up but Draco has other plans.

"Potter, your smile crawls into my delicate skin and irritates me inside my bones. What the bloody hell are you doing in here?" Draco gripped the other man's arm and flashed frustrated eyes to him.

"Well, I…" he answered sheepishly, not in any way the angsty boy Draco knew. Harry explained everything that happened in the past hour and sighed.

Harry definitely was not in the right state of mind, Draco pondered. An eyebrow was raised as an arm snaked into the Harry's head. He felt for a bump or bumps as he remembered and sighed a very deep sigh.

"Potter, stand up slowly," he ordered the man and added, "Stay put, oi!"

Harry never felt giddy most of the times, only when he was drunk or half-drunk or because of this once, concussed. He examined the blonde standing before him and held on for dear life.

"Malfoy, you have got to save me! I'm a hobo!", he pleaded, going around and standing in front of the ex-enemy. The other examined him once again and led him to a room.

"Do you feel sleepy, Po- Harry?"

"What? Ah.. now that you mention it, sort of.. I feel tired , you know, from those walking around, magicking away…" he mumbled the last words and angled his face to look at Draco.

"Don't sleep, you got me?", he looked at him seriously and made him comfortable in the bed. Before he went outside, "I'll get a doctor for you"

Harry made wild eyes and moved to stand up but Draco was striding and before he could comment, the door was slammed shut. He was scared Draco would leave, leaving him with nothing. Their history was something worth dwelling on but hopefully, he would be helped as what his family did before.

Minutes passed, Harry was starting to drift away but remembered that someone, probably Draco, ordered him to stay awake. He summoned courage and focused on not sleeping. Another minute passed and a knock on the door sounded.

Not waiting for an answer, Draco led the doctor to Harry's side and waited for the diagnosis. He sat halfway from the patient and pondered.

"Mr. Potter, good thing Mr. Malfoy here found you. You hit your head badly from the incident, do you understand?"

"Hmm, I guess that's why it's throbbing so much", Harry felt his way around his head and detected several bumps on the way.

"We need you to contact your family so that they will be here to wake you up every few hours. According to tests, the concussion is not serious but we might as well take precaution. Do you have someone nearby?"

"Well, all of them are in London right now and I'm not sure if anyone uses or knows how to use a phone…"

Draco knew it was coming. He should have seen it and planned ahead of it but as he was shocked to see his school rival here, in Asia, out of all places, he was in no way in control of the situation.

"I'll take him home, if you agree, doctor Cortez," Draco suggested. He really saw this coming minutes before.

"Well, sure, Mr. Malfoy. The ER is full already and your friend here seems like you can handle it okay. Just phone us if anything happened."

Mr. Cortez was a man of simple decisions and simple outcomes. Unholy things does not faze him anymore, a concussion, open bone fractures, 4th degree burn victims, all sorts of things inserted in the behind, but an exceedingly awkward moment when the patient jumped from his bed to the arms, (not waiting arms) of dry-ice Draco Malfoy, he was unwittingly disturbed. What in heaven is there relationship to each other?

The doctor cautiously produce a cough that cleared his thoughts, and the two "friends" moved a bit faraway from each other. Mr. Cortez signed the paper and a waited for Harry to sign the waiver so they could go.

Draco grabbed the dark-haired man's wrist and strode purposely outside the hospital.

"Hey Draco, when did you divorced Ginny?", Harry asked while slowly walking into the mudded sidewalks.

Draco whipped his head and stared at him.


Notes: Yay, first chapter. I'm not good at cliff-hangers, as you might indicate. So random, huh? Well. Let's see what would happen next chapter. I wish it would go well. The song on the top was from Rent. If you watched the movie or enjoyed the musical, you'll realize the relation of this story to that song. Well, not so much, haha.