first thing in the morning i delete all the hate from her IG comments. i will do this at least three more times through the day.

the next few tasks come with no specific order. i pick up the ball gown that someone spilled their cosmo on. i am texted an order for lash glue and size eleven extra narrow insoles. some mornings, she will call and ask me to pick up a vegan breakfast burrito and poppers, but she will only ever call for this, and rarely. i post either a long-dormant performance still or a thank-you selfie from the previous night’s show. it was taken to look rushed, exuberantly breathless and blurry, although it was exquisitely planned. i spend twenty minutes searching for the right venue to tag because there are three different Lucky 13’s in the metropolitan area alone, two of which are gay spots.

during all this time she is working too, of course. i make it sound like i am shunted all the work, but she has actually never stopped working since 2013 when she spent her first and only week living in a car. last night with her sugar daddy she half slept before dashing off to her secret AirBnB. she rarely lets me visit it because it’s covered in taffeta and sequins and sewing machines and pinned-up drawings and food wrappers and tiny trash cans filled with spunk napkins and makeup wipes.

if i know her, she’s there by six to sew, maybe to fix a torn panty or to design some tacky sexy chicken costume for a gig. she restyles wigs, which takes hours and some toxic inhalation of hairspray. she tweets about enemas to streams of faves. she eats a bagel from two days ago, aging on what passes for a kitchen counter, and then remembers that she must text her actual boyfriend good morning or he will become suspicious.

by 3 pm we call each other and she tells me the plan. it’s all up there in her brain in a mechanical order, no agenda, no planner. today she’s off for a photo shoot so i won’t be needed, though she may text me afterward so i can follow up with the team; tomorrow she’s got drag brunch and she could really use me to come by for some photos, and she promises i’ll get a free eggs benny out of it; afterward she’s teaching a private makeup client and needs me to book a studio because her apartment is really in no state, unless i feel up to coming by to clean, but honestly god forbid, that’s only if i really am up to it, and she’ll pay for it either way; the following day there’s a show that she must attend serving body and face, but she doesn’t know which old look to pull out, so i should check the RSVP list on Facebook to determine what queens will be there and which outfits they’ve seen, and could i ask my friend who works at the venue if they can’t get us in free…

if it is a weekday, i will wash sweaty collars, buy new fishnets, track social analytics, field inquiries about upcoming performances. sometimes we attend second-rate indie showcases and i am the earpiece for her commentary. after such a show she will go up to one performer and only one, compliment them on some death drop they landed, and gracefully exit amid their cries to collab or kiki sometime.

if it is a weekend, we will do seven performances in a row, each with two costume changes. we take four train trips and several car rides in between, shuffling around ten pound stilettos and a yak’s weight in wigs and tiny clacking makeup palettes and a bright red telephone prop and, tucked into a hidden pocket, floggers and needles for the after-hours B/D party. she carries the fragile things, all in cases and bags concealed in black. we’re both wearing black, looking unobtrusive. if someone asks, as they sometimes do, whether they have a rainbow flag pin on their backpack or not, we reply that it’s just moving day, and we’re doing it on the cheap.

during shows i am always asked if we’re friends, sometimes if we’re dating. friends, i say, and with the demeanor of a friend or a hag, i drop her IG handle and befriend fellow audience members in the din. “she hosts a drag brunch every Saturday too…”

when we part ways it is usually very late. i am never required to come to any kink parties and would usually not be allowed in anyway, but even before those, it is very late. i take her discarded garments to my place to be vodka-sprayed until laundry day. i take any business cards she’s received to enter into our mutual spreadsheet on the train ride home. 

before we part ways, usually half-forgotten so she must turn back and do a little skip toward me, she will give me a hug with one arm crook, in whatever state of undress or shedding boa or intoxication, stubble and wig-cap with matted fluff peeking, and say “thank you Anya. get home safe, baby.”