“She hasn’t given interviews,” Rosemary replied. “I think she might give me one.”
“She’s got nothing to say.”
“A lot of women would be very interested in her story.”
“Her story’s already out there. You wouldn’t be doing her any favors putting it in your book.”
“I’m not looking to do your mother favors, I’m looking to learn more about women who face insurmountable odds and beat them.” Rosemary glanced at Nikil. “I realize it sounds off the subject of the book you bought the rights to, but I think it would work with the core story, which is women’s achievement. If I’m meant to write about my own experiences with a team of women on the Seven Summits, mightn’t readers be interested in learning about the women who came before us, the legends who are still climbing?”
Nikil had taken off his glasses to wipe them on a napkin. “Can we rewind a minute? Who are we talking about? His mom?”
“Yangchen Beckett,” Rosemary said. “She was the first Nepalese woman to summit Everest.”
“The first one to come back alive,” Kal corrected.
“She’s summited seven times, giving her the record for the largest number of summits by a woman.”
“Someone else will beat the record before you even get your book finished.”
“I don’t think so.” Rosemary wiped her fingers on her napkin and took a sip of her water. The soup was delicious, the broth rich, the noodles chewy and satisfying. She wondered if Kal’s soup was even better, but he didn’t look as though he was in the mood to let her try it.
She shouldn’t have sprung the idea on him.
“Where’s the story, though?” Nikil asked. “I mean, yeah, inspiring sports profile, that’s compelling, but I don’t know how many people have ever heard of his mom, no offense, so it’s not grabbing me yet.”
“Why do you think my story is any more sellable than hers?” Rosemary asked. “Is it because I’m white? Is it because I’m rich? Or maybe it’s because I’m pretty?”
Nikil pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Okay, yeah, those are some confronting questions, I like that. Confronting is good, and feminism’s hot right now, big with the Millennials, it’s a good spin. But he said her story’s already out there. What did he mean by that?”
Kal picked up his fork and wound noodles around it, wearing the mild and impenetrable expression that Rosemary was beginning to learn to expect whenever there was something he didn’t wish to talk about.
“Would you like to tell him?” she asked.
“You’re the expert on my mom. You tell him.”
She’d only had the idea of opening her book with Yangchen’s story on the walk over from the kyidug, and as soon as it had occurred to her, she’d intuitively felt that Kal wouldn’t approve. Yet she hadn’t been able to shake how much she wanted, having met Yangchen, to know more about her. To write about her.
Nikil was already tapping the screen of his phone. “How do you spell it?”
Rosemary spelled the name for him.
“I’ll be outside.” Kal pushed away from the table and walked out of the restaurant. Rosemary watched him going, helpless to stop him as Nikil tapped his phone, scrolled, read, and finally let out a low whistle.
“Did she do it?” he asked. “She killed that guy’s dad?”
“No, of course not.” Although the truth was she didn’t know. She only suspected.
“Nobody would blame her. It says he beat her, attacked her in front of a judge in the divorce court. Unless that part’s not true?”
“It’s public record. There are also records of a full inquiry in Nepal into the circumstances of Merlin’s death. Yangchen was never charged. Revenge murder is not the story.”
“It sounds like the story.”
“It’s not the story.” Rosemary had stood, her hands planted on the table in front of her. Kal’s friend was watching her from behind the counter. The other diners, too, had paused in their eating to watch.
Nikil lifted both hands in a gesture of surrender. “Tell you what, let’s leave this to settle for a while, I’ll chat with your editor, and we’ll go from there. I’m intrigued.” He pushed his chair back, pulled out several twenty-dollar bills, and placed them on top of the table. “I like your drive, I like the story, there’s a little scandal, the whole inspirational feminist angle, it could be good, and you know, you’ve been through a thing, right? You’ve been through something, she’s been through something, you talk to each other, you find the story that wraps a fist around your guts and pulls hard, right? That’s the story we want, if you can get it, and if you can tell it.”
“I can tell it.”