A year has passed since the incident with Vlad Masters and the Disasteroid and Valerie Gray has quit ghost hunting for good.
It had been a sudden decision. One day she had still been the Red Huntress, patrolling the town, fighting ghosts, particularly Danny Phantom, the next she'd stopped using her suit and had never looked back.
She still considers it the greatest choice she had ever made. By finally giving up, Valerie had gained the time to do two important things. The first was to finally be the daughter her daddy deserved. Ghost hunting had made her grades suffer, and patrolling had left her more irritable than necessary at work. Sure, working at Nasty Burger was unpleasant but her co-workers didn't deserve to deal with her attitude. Most of them were just like her - trying to raise money to get out of Amity Park. Her boss sucks but her father had given her tips about how to deal with bad bosses and they've been a godsend.
The other? Valerie has at last done something she'd put off ever since that ghost dog had come along: thinking. And she does not like what she has come to realize.
How conceited had she been, how unobservant was she, to have never considered that shooting first and asking questions almost never wasn't productive? Sure, she'd been younger and more foolish but she could have killed people, killed Danny or Danielle. At least if she'd been aiming for Vlad Masters . . .
Valerie knows that her anger is a problem. But it's a hard one to solve. Daddy doesn't have as much money as he used to, nor time, so therapy isn't something they can just pursue on a whim, especially for a good therapist. Her father's insurance isn't that great. She has always tried to control it with breathing exercises, counting to ten and all that. Yet when she's in the moment it's easy to fall into the red. (And she had willingly called herself the Red Huntress? Stupid, stupid, stupid.)
The Grays were at least middle class, they were educated. Even before Valerie's mother had died, they had cultivated a reputation of being the sort of people who were interested in just getting through each day at a time. They were black but they weren't that type of black. Valerie didn't speak AAVE, she didn't blast traditionally black music outside of some jazz or R&B occasionally, and she focused on being calm and polite. Amazing how all those years of effort had gone straight down the drain.
Not even that they weren't as wealthy as they used to be anymore. She'd gotten over that. (It still hurt, though. Her father, Damon Gray, had told her as a little girl about how rare wealth was in the black community, since jealous white people had often gone out of their way to destroy or steal it. Black Wall Street was one of the most infamous examples.) No, she just wishes she hadn't taken her father down with her.
He'd lost his job, had to move from his house, had an out of control daughter who had been hurting more than she'd helped, and yet he still kept going. He was the strongest person Valerie knew. Not like her.
She'd been so mad at the ghost dog, at Danny. And for what? "Ruining her life?" Valerie has had a year to think about it and she understands now. She just wasn't meant to have that great life. Not after how she'd acted. All those years of effort and she had become exactly what she'd worked so hard to not be:
The Angry Black Girl.
It wasn't even just the anger part. It was the envy, the blaming a white kid for all her problems rather than taking personal responsibility. She had literally become nothing more than an anti-black stereotype, to the point that she'd been terrorizing ghosts just like the black community had been treated for years.
These days, Valerie has to struggle not to punch her reflection in the mirror.
She goes through each school day avoiding other people. It's not even for the old reason—that she thought she was better than most people, that she was doing some more important than school - but because she just prefers being alone now. Social interaction is just too exhausting these days. Anxiety bubbles up every time someone like Star or worse, Danny, tries to approach her, but she never lets any conversation go past pleasantries.
Valerie owes Danny a full apology. She knows it. But how to even begin? Sam and Tucker glare at her like the good girlfriend/friend they are and she knows they'd (rightfully) pick apart anything she says. Danny, the sweetheart, would probably forgive her when she doesn't deserve it. So it's better to just stay away, to not apologize. It means no one forgives her and she can continue her life in near solitude.
Her deserved solitude. She had ditched people, had never put in the effort to trust others or be trustworthy herself.
The one good thing in her life these days? Her father is proud of her. She wonders if she's worthy of it sometimes. Sure, she'd pulled her grades up and work is going fairly well, but it's approaching the end of junior year now and she still has no idea what to do about the future. How could she? First she'd been too busy ghost hunting, now she was trying to make up for those days to even have a future. But even if she had money for college, what would she study?
Valerie has no illusions about herself. She's not especially good at any subject. Her grades are fairly solid A's and B's but she is more of a "jack of all trades, master of none." That's not good enough for a college major. It's also hard to get attached to anything in particular, when she knows better than ever how easy it is to end up in a completely different career due to circumstances.
If there was one thing she would tell her past self, it was ignore the ghosts and try to live a normal life. Then maybe she would not be in her current mess. Maybe she'd be able to stomach her own reflection, have dreams for the future, have friends.
Maybe she'd be able to see herself as more than just the Red Huntress, the Angry Black Girl.
Author's Note: Growing up, Valerie Gray was my favorite character on Danny Phantom and that is mostly still true. She had more of an arc than either Sam or Tucker (which is probably why I was never a big fan of either character). We all know that the cancellation of the show abruptly ended her arc just when it was going somewhere but even keeping that in mind, as an adult I notice that Valerie Gray could easily be read as an angry black woman. I don't necessarily see her that way as I think she has more depth than that. And as a black woman and a writer, I thought I'd write this piece exploring the possibility of Valerie becoming self-aware about potentially becoming this stereotype. It's fairly angsty but that's because I don't really know what direction I would take this version of Valerie in (plus I'm somewhat projecting since my own mental health is not in a great place). Haven't managed to watch full episodes of the show in years so this if isn't perfectly accurate, please correct me. All criticism is welcomed.