This is an interesting piece. I am not acquainted with your tone, so excuse me if I say something stupid that goes against your style. Structurally, I think you could do a lot with this concept. The way I see it, there is the old man's story in the first half, the husband's in the second. My gut reaction at first was that there was too much after the reveal, in the conventional narrative building to a climax idea. It does peter out after the reveal, but then, you don't want to overshadow that, you are looking to show the whole lives of the couple, and of course life peters out for most of us. I think symmetry is important in this piece with a title like that.
Snow glazed gently across the window of the train as it drove through the white Sierra Nevada Mountains, speeding towards Tahoe from Nevada, passing through forests of pines underneath a thick grey sky. The train ran smoothly and fast through Nevada, but as the incline into the mountains began, and as the snow blew harder and stronger, the train moved with increasing difficulty.
There are a lot of sophisticated things in this work, but I think the phrasing in the opening lines is letting you down. In some cases well chosen verb can do the work of ten adjectives, and sometimes adverbs actually take away some of the impact of the phrase. "glazed across" seems somehow cumbersome to me. "smoothly and fast", "harder and stronger", and "moved with increasing difficulty" are kind of ineffectual, strong verbs, preferably with an onomatopoeic edge them (surged, chuffed, hurtled, etc etc, you can think of better ones),might make for a bolder opening.
"Snow glazed the window as the train sped towards Tahoe through the pine forests of the Sierra Nevada Mountains."
Would be how I'd edit it, but there are about a million different ways of doing it, so whatever feels right. Sometimes it helps doing the writing it in half the number of words, then double, then the number your started with trick, if nothing else it clarifies what the essential and climactic parts of the sentense are.
The wife’s eyes were glazed and unmoving.
Intentionally double glazed? If so, make more of a thing of it.
Her face was freckled and she had dark brown eyes with slits of green.
This is very deliberate. You are being very nice to us, which makes me think that when you were at school you had an English class that did not understand your stuff. If you want to be more mean and/or sneaky, you can hide these clues more. I like the slits though (that's what he said).
The husband did not speak with a consoling voice. His voice did not intend to invite more conversation. He spoke with a voice that was matter-of-fact and stiff.
Likewise, this could be "His voice was not consoling. It was stiff, matter of fact, and did not invite further conversation." (That's what she said)
“It is painful to look at the snow,” said the husband, looking at the old man. “It’s frustrating.”
“It’s so blank and white.”
I like the dialogue there is something surreal or absurd about it. Makes your brain tingle.
The husband gave his wife a tight smile, a smile that was returned with a face dry of emotion, and then returned to his book.
Dry emotion is a really lovely way of putting it. Well done, very subtle.
The wife listened without looking and the husband gripped his drink, feeling the icy, wet perspiration of his glass, taking large mouthfuls of the drink, feeling it burn in his throat, burn great into his stomach feeling the burn as the only thing that he could feel.
Unruly run on sentence. Perspiration is a nice touch though.
“It’ll warm you up, though,” said the husband, toasting to the old man and speaking in an ironical tone, “this one’s to you.” The husband finished his drink, thinking that how he wished that it could have been stronger, that there had been less coke and more whiskey, in fact much more whiskey that coke, wishing that there had been only whiskey and no coke and a bottleful as well.
Stylistically this is strong. I can't help hearing it in like a children's book voice in my head.'Poohbear thought how much nicer it would be if there were more honey, indeed if there were even more honey and even more of marijuana his dealer had hidden in the jar. Those Bananas in Pyjamas sure were right about those munchie honey cakes.'
‘sometimes the best, most important memories you ever get are the ones that you can never really remember, the ones that are just a blur, but you know what happened. You can’t describe them, you can’t tell another living soul, but you know that what happened, happened, and that’-‘
Pretty
The train continued on while the forest outside began to dwindle.
When I was in primary school, I wrote a description of a storm, and it started with "The storm grumbled on.". My teachers laughed at me, 'Storms can't grumble' they said, and scribbled it out, changing it to 'The storm continued on". I hate the word continued because it doesn't do or say anything, it just is. But obviously, I would be biased from that childhood trauma, being deprived of personification. Which do you think is better, 'grumbled' or 'continued'?
“We are going to Tahoe,” answered the husband.
“Tahoe? Oh, Tahoe is a wonderful place. I’m from Auburn.”
“Auburn is a nice area too,” said the husband.
“Where are you coming from?”
“Utah.”
“What were you doing there?”
This feels real, it's exactly the kind of conversation you have with someone on a train.
The husband section I don't like quite as much, maybe because all the cards are on the table, maybe because it isn't as layered as the first section. It is still strong, just beside the first half, it pales by comparison. The flashbacks are very deliberate and opaque, it might be interesting to weave them into the physical moment a bit tighter, it might help keep the two reacting off one another, he has this whole journey in his head, she is kind of left behind, and to me that doesn't quite feel organic. We're arguing, you're crying, but I'm just going to pause that and go have two of the biggest paragraphs being introspective over here. It's good stuff, nice details, but where it is, it's anti climactic. You could put it prior to him saying he wants out to raise the stakes when he does say it.
I think you would like "Encyclopaedia of Snow" by Sarah Emily Miano, and I am not saying that because there is snow in both, her tone in the longer sections has a crushing poignancy that doesn't slip into the contrived and melodramatic, you may find an affinity there.
Anyway. Gorgeous. Keep up the good work.
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