HARPER DICKINSON, KARDASHIAN HUNTER
It wasn’t hard for me to hate Kardashians. It’s in my blood. But I never guessed how much I’d pity some of them. Or how much I’d love one.
My high school in South Pasadena had all the usual characters. The handsome jock. The beautiful student council president. The charming stoner who was probably smarter than the two of them put together. Even the weird shy girl who hid in the back of the classroom scribbling shy girl secrets in her diary.
One day two government agents came to class – and you just knew they were feds the second they walked in – and, to everyone’s surprise, they walked right past the jock and the politician and the charming stoner all the way back to the shy girl. Me. “Harper Dickinson,” said the Tall Fed. “We need you to come with us.”
I didn’t argue.
They took me to a peeling farmhouse on the edge of a pistachio grove. There was a modern theater in the basement. They showed me a movie starring me. It turned out I wasn’t really just the borderline agoraphobic child of well-meaning but boring parents. I was a genetic abomination, a hybrid clone of Emily Dickinson and Harper Lee (with a dash of Willa Cather), engineered, at the cost of trillions of dollars, to do one thing: Fight Kardashians.
“But why?” I asked.
“Just look at them,” said the Short Fed, as he switched on the TV. I looked – and all the Dickinson/ Lee (and Cather) genes in me fused into an unquenchable ball of molten ire. “They produce nothing,” continued the Fed, unnecessarily, “And yet they thrive.”
“They are my opposite.” I stared at the screen, hungrily. I had known Kardashians existed, of course, in theory, but something about them, some atavistic revulsion, had kept me from really noticing them before. Now I noticed. “When do I start hunting?
The Tall Fed looked nervous. “Don’t you want to know why?”
“I know why,” I said. “They’re corruptors. They’re worse than parasites. They’re disease. They contribute nothing, learn nothing –”
“Actually, Kim’s getting a law degree –”
My eyes flashed him into silence. “Can you imagine anyone foolish enough to hire her?”
The short one whispered I think she’s a little too into this but I pretended not to notice.
“Anyhoo,” said the Tall Fed, “We figured we’d let you get your feet wet with Rob, then you could work your way through some of the lesser Jenners before we –”
“Don’t waste my time,” I said. I felt a click. It was like I was closing my diary, locking it, and stowing it under my bed, forever. I knew what I had to do now. “If I am to conquer the Kardashian hive-mind, I must destroy the infection at its source. I must defeat the Queen.”
The agents shared an uneasy look. “You don’t mean…”
“I mean exactly that. This time tomorrow, I will be facing Kris Jenner. Alone. And I will win.”
Next Week: Inside Kastle Karsdashian!