Kim Kardashian, 1983 – A Short Story by Josh Burt
Here’s Kimmy!
So, get this, the time machine worked. It worked! Kanye had the scientist working on it day and night, he’d been paying him a king’s ransom, supplying him with DeLoreans like in Back to the Future, phone boxes like in Bill and Ted and Doctor Who, he’d even inquired about the hot tub time machine from the movie Hot Tub Time Machine. But no need. Less than three years in, and this guy – fully bearded and practically estranged from his wife and child – had created a machine that could take you back in time to wherever you wanted to go. It looked like one of those hairdryer chairs that old women used to sit in.
Kim was super-excited, she Instagrammed a picture of herself standing in front of it, looking over her shoulder wearing just a pair of knickers and a bra. “My baby bought me a time machine!!” Her legions of fans couldn’t believe it. They loved her so much. She Instagrammed a picture of her face looking really grateful for all of their kind words, and then a few minutes later she posted another picture of the contraption, but this time she was just smiling and it was behind her and she said “OMG I’m so excited where should I go?”
One guy said “to Africa!” which didn’t really make much sense. He just wanted Kim to notice him. Someone took it way too seriously and said something about going back to the day before 9/11 (like 9/10) and killing Osama Bin Laden. “I’m not going to kill ANYONE!” thought Kim. She wanted to go back to a cool time, like the 1980s which she knew from being really little but couldn’t remember properly. She loved the fashion! She could be friends with Madonna, as in like THEN-Madonna, not now-Madonna who was a total bitch. “I LOVE YOU GUYS SO MUCH!” she wrote on Instagram, accompanying it with a picture of her doing a peace sign for her fans.
She put on her best retro clothes, including some really tight bright leggings and neon leg warmers, a figure-hugging boob tube, she wore electric blue lipstick and put her hair up in a side-ponytail. She was totally going to rock out in 1983, she called her look ‘aerobics chic’, she was going to go to gay clubs, she’d party with Madonna and Jellybean, she sat on the chair as Kanye looked on smiling and doing the occasional thumbs up to keep her pumped. The worn-out inventor programmed coordinates into a computer, and readjusted the bleeping metal hat that Kim wasn’t too happy about wearing because it looked so dorky. She Instagrammed a “sad face” selfie. But inside she was still super-psyched.
“Stay tuned for some amazing pics from 1983!” she told her fans on Instagram, saying it out loud as she wrote it, and accompanying it with a quick snap of her pouting face and her large breasts. The scientist began to chuckle.
“I’m sorry can I help you?” she asked tersely. She looked at Kanye with an expression of fury and bewilderment as if to say ‘who the fuck’s this idiot?’.
“I’m sorry, Mrs West…”
“Ms Kardashian!” she barked back, extremely feministly, because she was a businesswoman.
“I’m sorry, Ms Kardashian, I was just chuckling because I liked your joke. Obviously there are no cell phones in 1983, and no internet, so I was… um…”
He stalled, as her eyes appeared to be growing wider, and the colour appeared to be draining from her face.
“So… I was just… um… laughing at your joke… “ he trailed off completely.
“Yeah this isn’t really working for me,” said Kim, getting up from the chair and chucking the stupid hat on the floor.