So, this is my first ever Rent fic, and I've only seen the movie, and I've only seen it once, but I'll try to be as accurate as I can. Read and Review guys, I'd love to keep this going if people are interested.

Disclaimer: I don't own Rent. Fer srs.

...That was sarcastic chat speak, by the way.

If a happily ever after ever existed at all, Mark would have thought last Christmas Eve would have been it. He had just finished a film, one he was proud of, at that, about something real. Mimi was alive and Roger was happier than Mark had ever seen him. Maureen and Joanne were back together, and Collins was faring just as well. Even Benny had dropped by sometime around New Years, asking for a new beginning. Something Mark had at that time decided must have been the holiday spirit (more likely it was the fact that they were all deliriously happy and tipsy at the time, he had later realized) prompted them to give in, and now seeing Benny around town wasn't an occasion for a sneer and snarky remark, but a small smile and nod in greeting. The problem was something he hadn't thought of then: that wasn't the ending. There never really was a happy ending, because the only real ending was death.

Now here he was, six and half months later, sitting next to a window in the loft, staring at the horizon line where the buildings met the sky across the street, a pen and blank notebook in front of him. After the Christmas Eve masterpiece he'd made, he hadn't come up with a single decent idea. He had even reverted to writing screenplays, always attempting to base characters on his friends without being too obvious, but that had only ended with a very, very odd character, something of a cross between Joanne and Mimi (lawyer by day, dancer by night) that had boggled even HIS mind so much he had given up. That was his problem, he now realized, the people in his life had become so vivid and real that manufactured characters, imaginary people from his head, couldn't even hold a candle (no pun intended on Mimi's behalf) to the real things.

With a frustrated sigh, he tossed the pen onto the table and put the notebook back by Roger's door, where he had snagged it, having planned on claiming he had no idea what happened to it if Roger asked. He crossed to the kitchen, opening the cupboards to see if by some small chance they had any snack food lying around. He pushed aside Roger's AZT case and a couple cans of vegetables, before finally seeing something that caught his eye. "Aaaha!" he exclaimed to himself, pulling out a package of Oreos. Heaven knows how old they were, but they looked perfectly fine to him. Carefully putting Roger's AZT back in it's place, he closed the cupboard and plunked down on the couch, already munching on the fantastic little black and white cookies. Glancing around, the biography of Alfred Hitchcock that he'd bought caught his eye, and soon he had immersed himself in chocolate and words.

He was halfway through both the book and the Oreos when there was a sharp knocking on the door. "Who is it?" he called, hesitant to get up since he'd finally worked the thin couch pillows into a comfortable mush position.

"MARK, open the dooooooor!" called a familiar female voice, and Mark sighed. After an attempted robbery, which would have been a successful robbery had Roger's guitar not proved a viable weapon (and it hadn't even been damaged), they had decided to put a lock on the door. Ever since then, Mimi had constantly been forgetting about the lock, and had already lost two keys despite the fact that she practically lived here now (they still kept her apartment downstairs, and had converted it into a studio for Mark's films, should he ever make another, Roger's music, and Mimi's dancing). Grudgingly, he folded down the page in his book, set the cookies on the table, and pushed the door open to reveal a slightly disheveled Mimi, who blew past him the second the door opened wide enough, depositing her purse in a pile on the floor, before sinking onto the couch.

"You okay, Mimi?" Mark asked hesitantly, afraid something was really wrong with Mimi. She was usually upbeat and hardly ever entered the apartment without a 'hello' and a smile, except on the occasion that she was pissed at Roger, in which case the typical greeting was either a slammed door or a 'fuck you'. Never silence. Mimi groaned slightly.

"Yeah, I'm fine." she sat up some and looked over the back of the couch at Mark. "I absolutely hate the heat." Mark let out a short laugh, hiding his relief. "Don't laugh, I'm serious!" she said, but there was a smile creeping onto her face, "It's murder on my hair. The damn humidity!" With that, she stretched out on the couch, occupying Mark's former spot. He should have figured. Rather than stand around awkwardly, he headed over to the sink, pouring two glasses of miraculously clean tap water and carrying one over to Mimi, who swallowed almost all of it in one gulp. She scooted over on the couch, making room for Mark.

"Any idea where Roger is?" he asked, sitting down and throwing his arm casually around her. Usually, Roger wasn't far from Mimi, unless of course they'd had a fight. Mimi rolled her eyes.

"I don't know, and I don't care!" she announced with what Mark could tell was mock conviction.

"Yeah, you do." he said matter of factly. She opened her mouth to protest, but then closed it again and sighed.

"Yeah, I really do. And I think he's with Maureen, working on music for her new play...concert...performance art...thing." On the final word, she threw up her arms. Mark knew what she was thinking, and the thought almost made him laugh.

"Mimi, trust me, Maureen and Roger is the last thing you'll ever have to worry about. When I was dating her she was here a lot, and all they ever did was argue over who ate the last bagel and bitch about each other when the other one wasn't around." Mimi giggled a little as he said this.

"I know. I'm ridiculous, I know he loves me. And I love him." A genuine, sincere smile came across her face, one of those contagious ones that made Mark smile as well. For a few seconds she stayed in that state, happy at the thought of her and Roger, their couple-y-ness and love. Mark was suddenly jealous, not of them particularly, but of their bliss. He hadn't had a relationship since Maureen, which was -Jesus Christ- over a year and a half ago. And Maureen had been quite a train wreck, anyway.

"So," Mimi interjected, bringing Mark out of his sour trance, "Any new films on the way? I think your camera's getting dusty in the studio down there." Mark shrugged.

"I've tried. But after last year...nothing seems good enough. I think I'm done. Talent's gone." As he made that last statement, Mimi's face became serious. She turned so that she was facing him and grabbed his chin, turning his head till he was facing her.

"Mark Cohen, you listen to me. If you can make a film as great as the one last Christmas Eve, you can make something better. In this world, there's never a time when you'll run out of ideas. Talent doesn't just go away. It just hides sometimes and you have to find something to bring it out. To inspire you." This was possibly the deepest thing Mark had ever heard Mimi say, to him anyway. He was sure she said things like this to Roger all the time, but she'd never had the cause or opportunity to bestow one on Mark. He smiled and nodded. She was making sense. Well, that and Serious Mimi was kind of freaking him out.

"Just like you inspired Roger," he said, and a smile once again broke out on her face.

"Yeah, like that." She patted his cheek like he was a little kid and sunk back into a comfortable position on the couch.

"Now all I have to do is find some sexy dancer that lives nearby and will throw herself at me willingly. That shouldn't be too hard." he said, his tone dripping with sarcasm. Mimi stuck out her tongue and whacked him playfully in the back of the head.