Disclaimer: Danny Phantom is owned by Butch Hartman, Nickelodeon, and all those other assorted copyright-holders. I'm none of the above. Used without permission; no profit's being made.

Falling
by misaoshiru

She was done. Her hand ached, but she was done. Finally, her calculus final was over, and Jazmine Fenton had never been so relieved. (Well, that wasn't true, but it was close.)

Now, she just had to go home for the weekend. On Monday, she'd learn her grade.

It was with anticipation, then, combined with worry, that she entered that seventh period classroom the next school day. Her eyes scanned the grade sheet on the wall – ah, there. 252992, her ID number. Wait, B-plus? Eighty-eight-point-three percent? "This must be a mistake!" she said aloud. "C-can I see my test?"

"Sure," said the teacher, Mr. Rivera. He handed her a packet that had a big, fat C written in red ink on top.

Jazz's eyes widened. She flipped through the papers, searching for an excuse to deny it, to no avail. She had gotten a C on the final.

The bell rang. "Please take your seat, Miss Fenton," Mr. Rivera said, walking to the board and writing an equation on the board. Jazz complied, but all period, she felt like crying. Fentons didn't get B-pluses. They got A's. (Well, with the exception of her father, and sometimes Danny. But she was the educational angel of the Fenton family!)

The fact was, she hadn't exactly been doing as well as she wanted to in the class of late. She had skipped a few homework assignments to make room for other things, mainly things related to her younger brother. Jazz had no regrets, but she had allowed herself to fall behind.

When she got home, Jazz's mother said her usual "Hello, sweetie! How was your day?"

"Well, we had a lab today in biology, and we started a new book in English…andIkindofgotaBplusincalculus."

"A B-plus? That's great!"

"Huh?"

"Calculus really is a hard class, Jazz. I know that. Even I couldn't hold an A all semester when I took it in college, and you're taking it as a junior in high school! You should be proud of yourself, sweetie!"

"But I know I can do better, Mom!"

"Just don't beat yourself up about it. You really are doing well."

'I don't want to,' Jazz thought as she walked out of the room, 'but I can't help it. Their educational angel has fallen.'

In her bedroom now, her hands clenched around the fluffy green pillow her friend Meg had given her for her sweet sixteen. She cried. 'Danny would probably laugh at me right now,' she mused between tears. 'He's so strong, whereas I… Here I am, unable to pull myself over something silly like a B-plus!' She couldn't decide whether to laugh or to cry, so she did both.

Several hours passed. It was getting dark outside. Jazz had finally managed to compose herself around an hour after arriving home. Now, she sat on her bed in her pajamas. The radio was on; she would change it to a random station whenever the one she had been listening to went on commercial.

Danny hadn't come home yet. Jazz was worried, of course, but she figured (and hoped) that he was probably just playing videogames at Tucker's house. Until her cell phone started to ring. Praying to any god who would listen, even though she really wasn't the religious type, that Danny was unhurt, she answered, trying to hide the worry from her voice. "H-hello?"

"Jazz!" Sam said franticly. "Some ghosts attacked. Danny beat them, but…"

Her heart skipped a beat. "He's hurt, isn't he." It wasn't a question.

"Not too badly, but I think he's got a concussion, and we're kind of far away."

Jazz sighed in relief. "You guys need a ride."

"Yeah."

"Okay. Where are you?"

"Corner of Hazel and Finch, by the park."

"Wait by the picnic tables. I'll be there within fifteen minutes."

Tucker had apparently snatched the phone from Sam, since Jazz heard a muffled "Hey!" from the other end. "Fifteen minutes?" he said in a cheeky tone. "If you're late, is the pizza free?"

"Haha, Tucker," she said, rolling her eyes. "Just wait there, okay? Bye." She hung up, quickly pulling some jeans and a jacket over her pajamas and grabbing her car keys. Before long, she was out the door and on her way.

True to her word, Jazmine got there less than fifteen minutes later, eliciting an "Aw, no free food?" from Tucker.

Ignoring his comment, Jazz ran over to her brother, who was leaning against one of the tables' benches for support. "Why didn't you tell me about this?" she said angrily, glaring at Sam and gesturing to a medium-deep wound in Danny's side.

"He said he didn't want to make you worry," Sam said softly, looking down at her boots.

Danny smiled nonchalantly when his sister turned her glare on him, saying, "Sorry, Jazz."

Jazz sighed, shuffling through her purse for a roll of bandages. As she wrapped the wound, a strange thought came to mind. She didn't know where it had come from, and it was the oddest thought she'd had in some time, but it struck her in its trueness, at least in the Fentons' situation: 'Everyone needs a fallen angel to catch them when they fall.

End

Author's Notes
Calculus is evil. This piece is semi-semi-autobiographical. Except not. I really did get a B-plus for the first semester of AP Calculus, but that's about it as far as the autobiographicalness (is that a word?) is concerned.
Just to make things clear, Jazz was not crying for the whole hour, in case anyone was wondering. She spent most of that time obsessively poring over the test and looking for things she did wrong, as well as mistakes the teacher may have made grading it. (And...Jazz isn't listed as a character on that dropdown list! How sad!)