Often times, the youngest child of a family grows up in the shadows of their parents and siblings, and London Little was no exception. Raised in Albuquerque, New Mexico by William, a classics professor, and Phillipa, a trauma surgeon, who had particularly high expectations and wanted their kids to follow in their footsteps. Those standards came from a place of love, at least, but it didn't make it any less stressful. Juno and Orlando seemed to thrive, while London's achievements were frequently compared to theirs, and often her siblings seemed to take priority to their parents.

So London decided not only that she would stand out from them, but she would be better than them. She lived a strange double life as both a top student and a trouble maker. Every hour of London's day was overflowing with action--she'd be working on calculus homework on the drive to a party where she'd chug three beers, win a debate match in class the next morning while hungover, and then plant the seeds to break up the 'it' couple of the school by lunch. While her behavior certainly got her attention, it wasn't the good kind. More often than not, her parents ignored her successes and focused on her screw ups. "Why can't you be more like your siblings? Why can't you behave?" they'd ask. Which, really, only made her want to toe the line even less. She didn't even have many friends to turn to, since she tended to self sabotage those friendships. By the time she graduated, she had fewer friends than fingers.

Getting accepted into the computer sciences program at CalTech was one of the best days of London's life, despite her parents frustration that London was flying in the face of family tradition of going to Brown. London wanted her own life, her parents fury be damned. At CalTech, London was judged solely by her own merit, and it was a massive weight off of her shoulders. Without that particular source of stress, London didn't feel the need to lash out by stirring up drama, which in turn led to her making and keeping friends. They were young, genius, and unstoppable--or so they told themselves as they did half-drunk walks of shame to early morning classes.

Halfway through college, an incident with a cherry jubilee saw London shaving almost all of her (now very burnt) hair off. Two weeks later, a barista called London 'sir.' It was less a lightbulb going off than a match set to gasoline. London had been openly bi since high school and was active in the queer community, so London had access to the resources she needed to figure out what that meant. It took some digging before she found the word she was looking for: genderfluid. It felt more right than London knew anything could, and suddenly a lot of things from his younger years and his reactions to puberty made a lot more sense. It took a lot of explaining, to his family and his friends that he identified as both a man and a woman--sometimes both at once, and sometimes one or the other at any given moment--and liked male and female pronouns, but for the most part they were supportive. Confused, but supportive. London's largely cis-male peers in the tech field were... less so. London did his best to avoid them, and frequented gay bars and clubs more often to find a solid community there instead.

Upon graduating, he went to work in Silicone Valley, thinking he could handle whatever they could throw at him. But he underestimated just how toxic it could get behind closed doors. After a year and a half of sexism, transphobia, and harassment, London called it quits and didn't look back. It was one thing to challenge himself, and another to make himself needlessly miserable for the rest of his career. He switched to designing and maintaining websites for small businesses and artists, and picked up other side and seasonal jobs as he needed.

William and Phillipa were less thrilled about it. Almost every phone call and visit consisted of them telling London she was wasting her life and education, that she needed to do something with her life, that she needed to settle down and stop partying, that she needed to be more like her siblings, that she needed a proper career like Juno and Orlando.

It only took another year for things to hit a breaking point. When London was 24, she went home for Thanksgiving. What started as passive aggressive comments across the table quickly turned into a shouting match about the same arguments they always had, except for one detail; in a pique of frustration, William said, "Maybe we never should have adopted you!" London had never been so shocked. And then that shock turned into a fury unlike anything she ever felt before. She raged at her parents for lying to her, for keeping secrets, and accused them of loving her less for not being their biological child and not trusting her to love them just because they weren't her birth parents. More ugly words were thrown back and forth, and by the end of the night, London walked out of the house and hasn't spoken to her parents or siblings since.

The next few years were rough. His already unhealthy relationship with alcohol reached dangerous levels. He lost jobs, got new ones, and lost them too, usually for coming into work drunk or not showing up at all because he was hungover. More than one relationship was destroyed because of it, friends and partners alike. He wanted to prove to himself that he could live his life however he pleased, and to feel less of the loneliness and bitterness. But it wasn't sustainable, no matter what he told himself. In early 2017 when London was sorting through his budget, he realized he was spending more money on alcohol than on actual food--and had been doing so for months. This wasn't just the life of the young and carefree. This was dangerous. This was a problem. He needed to stop.

That was easier said than done. There were more false starts, relapses, and breakdowns than she cared to admit, and two different stints in rehab. It was ugly and messy, and London wasn't proud. But she was determined to keep trying, no matter how many setbacks. Whatever options there were for ways to cope, London looked into it and tried it. She's currently on her longest streak yet: sober since April 2018 and going steady. She's given up on having side jobs at the moment and is focusing solely on her programing business for income. It's been a struggle, and she's terrified that she might not be capable of fully recovering, but she'll be damned if she doesn't give it her best shot.