"Thank you all so much for doing this for me." Ray said, smiling as he watched the kids crawl into the pile of pillows and blankets set up for them.

"No problem! We noticed you didn't seem to be doing too good lately." Charlotte replied, handing him a box of candy.

"We thought it'd be a good idea to try and cheer you up with all this." Jasper added as he started a movie.

"This is amazing, really!" Ray said, laying on his chest and looking up at the screen.

There couldn't have been a better time for Henry and his friends to set this up. All day ray had felt inexplicably anxious and generally extremely paranoid, even moreso than usual. Hard part was, he couldn't figure out why to save his life.

But this little pile of pillows and blankets, the small group of friends, and their efforts to help him seemed to be enough to drive it all away. For the first time in a while, ray felt himself surrounded by happiness and love. It was as if his heart was more cozy than he was. Ray could stay there forever, it seemed. Everyone was snuggled up against each other, sharing blankets and overall enjoying each other's company.

Suddenly, Ray's phone went off. He asked them to pause as he answered, without looking at the caller. Once he heard the voice on the other end, it was like every one of his internal organs fell out of his body.

*     *     *

"...Are you alright?" Henry asked, everyone staring at an ashy, terrified ray.

The clearly panicked man slowly hung up and put his phone back in his pocket. "Huh? Oh yeah, I'll just be going now..." he replied and headed to his room. "It's getting kind of late anyways, you guys should be headed back to your houses soon."

Once he was gone, a faint but drawn-out scream could be heard. Henry, Charlotte, and Jasper exchanged looks.

"Who do you think called him?" Henry asked. "Do you think it was a supervillian?"

"It couldn't have been a supervillian." Charlotte replied, crossing her arms. "How did a supervillian get his personal phone number? Even then he could have easily pretended the villain had a wrong number."

"Why don't we just ask him?" Jasper said, sitting down on the couch.

"Do you think he'd tell us?" Henry asked. "If I got a phone call that made me freak out like that and someone asked who called I probably wouldn't tell them."

"Remember that time we walked in on ray sobbing like crazy on the couch here?" Charlotte reminded him. "He told us what happened then."

"Wait, what?" Jasper shouted in surprise.

"It Happened before you got a job here." Charlotte explained. Jasper nodded.

Henry stared at the now empty pile of pillows and blankets for a while, until he heard ray come back out and started picking it up and handing some of the things back to their owners.

"You guys should leave now, here's your stuff. Go take it home."

"Ray? Who called you?"

"Don't worry about it! Go home guys."

"Seriously-"

"I said go home!"

Deciding it was better to listen to him and go, the kids took their things and left.

"Why do you think ray kicked us out?" Henry asked, trying to make conversation. Nobody responded.
"I want to know why, or it'll bother me."

"Try sleeping on it." Charlotte replied, quickly checking the time. "That's what I do, and see if it still matters in the morning."

Henry thanked her for the advice and headed home, once he walked in the door, Piper jumped out, made a ridiculous pose, and let out a weird noise.

"Don't care." Henry replied, walking past her.

"What? You were supposed to do it back!" Piper shouted. "We always do that!"

"Not right now." Henry said as he went upstairs. "I have other things to do."

"Ugh, fine." Piper said before Henry closed the door.

For the next few days, ray had been acting even more paranoid and unpredictable. Eventually, Henry decided to go in and ask what it was, maybe since it was a few days since, he'd be a bit calmer.

"Hey, ray?"

"Yeah, what's up Henry?"

"What happened in that phone call?"

Ray froze, he seemed to go through six different emotions at one time, each one completely unrecognizable.

"It's not important. Don't worry." Ray replied, crossing his arms.

"If it's not important, then why won't you tell me?"

Ray was clearly trying to avoid eye contact with Henry. He moved over until he was right where ray seemed to be looking. "Seriously. Look at me."

Ray's eyes darted to the side again. "I told you not to worry about it."

"If you won't tell me, then I'm guessing it's pretty important." Henry said, walking towards ray as if he was going to start circling him.

Ray's piercing blue eyes showed an unreadable emotion, but it definitely wasn't a positive one.

"At least tell me why i can't know." Henry tried harder to coax at least some information out of him. "Is it going to put me in danger, whatever it is?"

"No, no!" Ray tried to walk away, but Henry stopped him. "It only effects me."

"What was in that phone call that made you act so weird?" Henry asked in an unintentionally harsh tone. "Are you going to die? Did that phone call tell you that you had a week to live or whatever?"

"What? No! Of course not!" Ray replied back, clearly a little shocked that Henry sounded so angry.
"Why do you care so much?"

"It's clearly bothering you!"

"I'm a grown man, I can handle this!" Ray turned around to face Henry and put his hand on his shoulder. "If you need to know so badly, it was an old friend."

"Old friend?"

"And it wasn't Drex." 

"If it was an old friend, than why are you so upset?"

Ray let out a resigned sigh and paused for a moment. "Sometimes, old friends will come back into your life. You know they're toxic people who wronged you before, but you can't get rid of them, Because they genuinely believe they didn't do anything wrong. So you're powerless. Nothing you can do against them besides do whatever small thing they want and tough it out."

Henry was going to protest, but ray walked off. He didn't understand. if they were a toxic person, why hasn't ray dropped them entirely?

He decided not to let it bother him, as he turned to go back up to junk-n-stuff, he saw ray take a big cardboard box marked "family photos" and left it near the tubes. Henry asked about it, and ray said he was just getting rid of some old stuff. He decided he wouldn't ask any further questions.

Once he went back up to junk-n-stuff, he plopped down on the couch next to Charlotte.

"What happened down there?" Jasper asked, leaning forward to hear what his friend had to say.

"He said he had to meet an old friend, and it wasn't someone he likes being around." Henry replied, still confused. "He was also getting rid of a big box marked 'family photos'"

Charlotte's eyes widened. Jasper let out a quiet gasp.

"Why would he do that?" Jasper asked, slowly pulling his hand away from his mouth.

Henry shrugged.

"Did you find out when he'd be meeting this person?" Charlotte asked.

"Yeah, I saw his phone had the calendar app open, and it was marked for this Friday at three o'clock."

"It's Wednesday now. You should sneak along with him!" Jasper suggested.

"Why would I do that?"

"To find out why he's acting so weird! After all, what if they end up being a supervillian in disguise, and they try to capture him?"

Henry paused for a minute. "That's actually a good idea. But I'll need you guys' help."

"We'll help you come up with a plan." Charlotte assured him before opening the notes app on her phone to help write down what they plan to do.

The rest of that work day and the next day were spent entirely in preparation. They decided henry would spend Thursday night in the man cave, sleeping in the guest room with headphones on so that he could be woken up by an alarm only he could hear, then he'd hide in the cupboards near the tubes and watch everything, and if it's safe for Henry to come out, head up the tubes and hide in Ray's trunk until they reached the agreed meeting spot, and would watch everything from afar.

Thursday night arrived quickly. He told his parents he'd stay the night at Jasper's, then snuck out and into the guest room, with nothing but a small backpack full of energy drinks that spent the previous day in the freezer, some granola bars for food, headphones, and a phone charger. He put on the headphones, plugged in his phone for the night and got a surprisingly good nights' sleep before being woken up at 4AM, and from there darted out and into the cupboards near the tubes, completely unheard.

Throughout the day, Charlotte and Jasper would subtly hand him notes to communicate, along with any information he might need. It felt like days, but luckily the hiding spot was easy to get out of when necessary. Ray let them off on his lunch break, exactly fifteen minutes before he had to leave.

Henry watched as ray walked out into the man cave after changing clothes, and noticed he has changed to a much baggier outfit, as if he was doing everything he could to hide his body shape. He found it odd ray would choose such an outfit, it seemed rather unlike him. Especially in summer.

He watched ray walk into the bathrooms, which was Henry's chance to make a run for it. He quietly slipped out of the hiding spot and darted over the tubes, whispered the codeword, and ran to Ray's car and yanked the trunk open and got in and closed it so fast it was like his life depended on it.

Once Henry had calmed down a minute, ray got in the car and drove off. The tired boy let out a relieved sigh. So far, the mission was a success.

The drive felt much longer than it ended up being, Henry was filled with anticipation. Where was ray going? Who was this mystery old friend? Exactly why was ray so afraid of them? Questions like this races around Henry's head until he heard the car stop and turn off. He waited until he was sure ray had walked off a little, and he snuck out of the trunk and followed a few feet behind ray. He was meeting someone at downtown brown, not very far from junk-n-stuff. Henry followed ray in, but kept his distance. He sat down a few tables away from ray, and sat behind him so ray wouldn't catch him by accident.

Ray looked so nervous, constantly fidgeting with his clothes as if he was making sure nobody could see hints of muscle or really any masculine feature.

Why he decided to do such a thing was entirely beyond henry. If it were cold out, that would make sense. But it's ninety degrees out! Henry thought, watching ray subtly but closely to see what would happen.

A beautiful woman about his age walked over, sporting a pair of jeans with a sleeveless black top with some lace down the middle, with long brown hair that barely hid bright blue earrings. She put her purse down on the table and greeted ray with a big smile. Ray didn't seem that happy to see her.

"Hey girl!" The woman greeted him.

This came as a shock to Henry. Girl? He thought.

"Hey... Liza..." ray replied, his voice was oddly high, it could almost pass for a woman's voice.

"Rachel! How long as it been? Two years?" She replied, smiling as she handed ray a coffee.

Henry almost choked on his drink. Wait, Rachel?
What was going on?

"Yeah, it's been a while." Ray (Rachel?) replied.

As the conversation went on, Henry listened, shocked yet dying to know what would happen next. The conversation came across many topics, talking everything from Liza's job as a makeup artist to Ray's, in her eyes, bad fashion sense. She kept saying he needed to wear things that flattered his shape. The entire time, ray seemed uncomfortable, but masked it well enough.

"Yeah, I adopted a few kids. Didn't i tell you about them last time?" Ray said, a hint of uneasiness in his voice. Liza picked it up. Ray's fake relaxed look finally fell.

"Why are you so nervous?" She asked.

"I'm not, just some stuff has been on my mind lately." Ray lied.

"Oh, I know just the thing to help!" Liza said, taking a sip from her fancy frappuccino.  "We'll have a girls' day! Hit up the spa, head to the mall for lunch, it'll be great!"

Wait, did she say girls' day? Henry could barely believe his ears. Upon hearing this, Henry decided his answers lie in the man cave, so he got up and left, and walked all the way back. Charlotte and Jasper had left for lunch, leaving Henry to head down to the man cave and ran over to that box marked 'family photos' he was going to get answers no matter what it took.

As soon as he got to the man cave, he opened up the box and gently took out the first thing on top. A framed photo of Ray's father next to a little girl in a sundress, about seven years old. Henry stared at it for a while, she had a small bow in her long brown hair. He slowly put it down, and took out another. A picture of that same little girl, standing next to a playhouse. It looked exactly like ray said the playhouse of his childhood looked like.

I thought ray didn't have a sister? Henry pondered as he kept looking through the photos. Another one showed this same girl as a teenager, in The lab ray grew up in, pretending to flex her arms for laughs. All of the pictures were of this mysterious girl, not a single one had ray in them.

Henry continued to look through the pictures. Polaroid of a myriad of cute toy animals, then of this same mystery girl with an impressive Lego castle Henry assumed she built herself. A picture of her with a big radio and holding several CDs.

If these were family photos, as they were marked, where was ray? Are these all pictures of an estranged sister? If that was the case, why didn't ray ever talk about her? Why wasn't he in any of these?

Suddenly, it hit him. Henry's eyes widened as he dropped the picture he was holding. Was ray the mystery girl in these pictures?

He looked back at one of the mysterious person when she was older, she did look at lot like his friend. All this time, had ray lied to him? Was captain man really a man at all?

He was so shocked by this that he barely noticed ray come down the tubes, and stop dead in his tracks when he saw Henry surrounded by the old photos.

"...Henry? Why are you looking at those?" Ray asked, his voice barely audible.

Henry looked up at him, frozen solid. "... are these pictures of you?"

The wide-eyed man (if he was even sure that's what he was) only stood there, unsure of what to say.

"Seriously, are these all you?"

Ray nodded his head, keeping his head a bit down.

Henry's jaw dropped. "YOU WERE A GIRL THIS WHOLE TIME?"

Ray's head shot upwards at that claim. "Absolutely not! I'm a man!"

"But... this girl is in the picture is you! You said so! That girl at the coffee shop called you a girl too! Why didn't you tell me?"

"Wait, you followed me to the coffee shop?" Ray said, sounding more angry than shocked now.

"I wanted to know why you were acting so weird! Is that why? Tell me, ray! If that's even your name!" Henry shouted back. "She called you Rachel? Is that your real name? I just wanna know the truth! If you're a girl, than why don't you wear dresses? Why do you have short hair? Why do you do whatever you do to your chest to make it look like that? Why do you call yourself captain MAN? Why do you-"

"YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND! YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND ANYTHING!" Ray cut him off, his voice roaring with the anger and pain of a man (woman?) who had to fight for every last thing before him now, all the way down to his body.

This was enough to quiet Henry down. He had never seen ray like this.

"Yes, that's all pictures of me" ray finally spoke, significantly calmer. "But I'm not a girl."

Henry stood in silence, surrounded by what he now realized were painful reminders of a past time.

"My body was, as everyone thought. But I wasn't."

"If that's the case, than why don't you have short hair and stuff in these pictures?"

Ray walked over the the couch and motioned for Henry to sit down next to him.

"Because I didn't always know I was a boy." He began. Henry listened attentively. "It took me a long time to realize. I was about your age when I finally figured it out. It was a long, hard, fight to get where I am today, but I'm here."

"Why didn't you tell me before?" Henry asked. "Why didn't you tell that girl at the coffee shop?"

Ray rubbed the back of his neck nervously. "I didn't really have a reason to. And there's no way I'm telling her, that could put me in actual danger."

Henry's head tilted in curiosity. "Then, sorry, but what happened to these?" He asked, pointing to his own chest.

"I got surgery years ago. I used to have really big gross scars on my chest." Ray replied, trying to lighten the mood ever so slightly. "I'm ray Manchester, proud transgender man and superhero."

Henry smiled softly before pulling ray in for a huge hug, which ray returned.

"I'm sorry you had to find out like this, henry."

Their moment of comfort was interrupted by Charlotte and jasper coming down the elevator, seeing pictures everywhere and ray and Henry hugging on the couch.

"Did some kind of near-death situation happen while we were gone?" Charlotte asked.

Ray stood up and turned to face the two, henry looking up at him.

"Should I tell them...?" Henry asked quietly.

"I'll do it." Ray whispered back. He turned to the two newcomers. "Nothing bad happened, just henry found out I was trans, and there was a lot of emotions."

"Wait, you're trans?" Charlotte asked in surprise.

"Yep! 10 years on testosterone, 5 years post top surgery and voice masculinization surgery!"

"I would have never guessed!"

He grinned. "Yeah, I do look pretty good for ."

"Wait, trans? As in transgender?" Jasper asked.

Ray nodded.

"So like, you want to be a woman?"

"Nope!" Ray laughed. "Been there, done that."

Jasper looked confused for a moment before getting it. "Oh, right."

"Anyways, I'm glad you're all okay with it." Ray said, smiling softly.

"of course!" Henry assured him. "Plus, now we've got a fourth person to go to pride next weekend!"

Ray turned around and pulled everyone into a group hug. He couldn't have asked for better friends.