Drenched in rain, then-freshman Jonas Zabriskie watched in awe of the drag performers at the annual campus drag show put on by the Student Activities Council. The show had a lasting impact on Zabriskie and a year later, he was on stage as Faux L’Beau — French for ‘fake boyfriend’ — performing alongside other drag queens and kings with years of experience.

Zabriskie went to his first drag show in his home state of Minnesota at age 18. But it wasn’t until about a year later at the seventh annual WSU drag show that Zabriskie decided to do drag.

“Last year’s drag show, I waited hours to get in the front row,” Zabriskie said. “After the show, I was like, ‘I’m doing this.’ I asked my friend how long it takes to decide to do drag and then perform, and they said it took about a year and I wanted to do it, like, tomorrow.”

Zabriskie’s character, Faux L’Beau, is “completely feminine” compared to other drag queens.

“I think I did that because I grew up being so athletic and was expected to be super masculine, working out, hanging out with the guys, doing my sports and being that jock,” Zabriskie said. “When I decided to do drag, I realized this is an opportunity for me to take those expectations off myself and be the exact opposite. I feel released.”

For Friday’s show, Zabriskie’s parents drove 10 hours from Champlin, Minnesota — a suburb of Minneapolis — to support Zabriskie in his first show.

“Our whole family, everybody is very supportive,” Zabriskie’s mom, Kim, said. “My mom sends him makeup and my cousin sends him heels. I think that our family is blessed in that everyone is open-minded cause I know there’s a lot of kids who are out there that don’t have that support.”

Zabriskie hasn’t received any pushback from family or friends about doing drag because everyone who would have a problem with it isn’t part of his circle anymore, he said.

“Everybody that I know is behind me, pushing for this, so there’s absolutely no going backwards,” Zabriskie said.

When Zabriskie told his parents he was going to do drag his father AJ – tall, with a long, scraggly beard – didn’t take it seriously at first, but both of his parents have been supportive from the start.

“I think he was a little leery of me, but I’ve been supporting him the whole time,” AJ Zabriskie said. “As long as he knows that what he is doing is for the best and for his best interest makes his life happy.”

“As long as he’s happy, we’re happy,” Kim Zabriskie said.