“I forgot to tell you I was dressing up,” I said, and realizing I needed a plausible reason for being so fancy, “I figured it would be good to take pictures there.”

Richard seemed to accept this explanation and picked up my camera bag.

“I’m your photographer for the night.”

We hailed a cab to the ICA, which took up an entire historic building in downtown Boston, its exterior hard to make out because of my poor distance vision and the blinding lights shining through the gallery windows, the biggest rectangle of brightness at the end of some stone steps that led us to the door.

“May I take your coat, madam?” a solicitous attendant in a tuxedo shirt and bow tie asked as he greeted me, and the way he said “madam,” combined with his awestruck, enthusiastic expression, confirmed what I already suspected when Richard showed up at my studio, that I had made a grave error. In my desire to make myself beautiful, I failed to account for the possibility of coming to this opening grossly overdressed, as the people around me wore cocktail attire while my gown and updo were fit for some gala, or maybe the Oscars. Worse, and what made me wince at the attendant’s attention, was that the one type of person who would wear an embellished gown with thick makeup and the most theatrical hairstyle to an early-evening reception was a drag queen, a role I was even more appropriate for in my four-inch heels. This was supposed to be the occasion when I would show Richard I could be a beautiful woman, but instead my outfit exposed me as a man in women’s clothes.

I wanted to turn around and tell Richard I suddenly didn’t feel well so we should go. But he stood beside me as I spied his understanding face, his continued readiness to escort me through this misadventure. I’d been a performer my entire life, and this was just going to be another turn, as I felt myself put on the armor of confidence that had gotten me through the worst of times.