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It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. Winston Smith was engrossed in the midst of a delicate chess game, he was yet one step away to checkmate before a bartender interrupted him by putting a slip of bill as well as another bottle of gin beside him. Without either looking up nor exchanging a word with the bartender, Winston grabbed the dirty brown bottle and gulped down a large mouthful of gin. Immediately, the strong liquid slid down his throat and hit the bottom of his stomach. His nostrils were filled with the awful smell of gin and his eyes started to water. With a movement that suggested the action had been practiced many times before, Winston took the slip of bill and dabbed away at his tears. Then, with an almost uncontrollable jerking movement, he carelessly tossed the crumpled-up piece of bill across the table. No one bothered to pay any attention to this, nor even the bartenders. In fact, the bartenders only paid attention to Winston when his glass is almost empty, after refilling up his bottle, they would go back to their busy lives as if he didn’t exit at all. Winston’s bill had always remained a mysterious number to him, for his bill was discharged every time for some reason. Besides, this never bothered him in the slightest. Nothing bothered him now.
He could still remember those day when he would wrap his head around pointless ideas, debating himself into an endless cycle of doubts and deceptions. Oh, how naive and unnecessary that was! How wrong and faithless he was back then. The past to him was nothing but a distant and vague dream, the Party broke him out of that illusion. Indeed, the Party had changed him. What happened to him in room 101 was so deeply ingrained in Winston’s mind with its most vivid details that still brought him waves of terror. O’Brien had helped to heal him. Yes, O’Brien. Winston remembered fondly of O’Brien’s burly figure with his fat neck and black overalls. His manner of speaking was assertive, and his intelligence was what had won Winston’s affection for him in the first place. He saved Winston from his own self destruction with words of wisdom. He had protected Winston, had he not? He was the beacon of a lighthouse, a lantern in the dark, he was the friend, the teacher, the helper and protector. “What happens to you here is forever.” O’Brien’s calm and powerful voice resurfaced into the back of his mind. “Here’s to you, O’Brien.” Winston started with an indistinct grunt and drank another mouthful of gin. With a loud burp that emitted the horrid smell of gin, he scratched his forehead and craned his neck to look outside.
A cluster of grey clouds gathered in the sky, forming a thick blanket which blocked the sunlight. Cold gusts of wind blew through the streets, sweeping and cleaning out everything in their path. The pedestrians outside shivered uncontrollably, rubbing their hands together and stumping their feet to regain some warmth. Some people who were lucky enough to own a coat had wrapped it around their bodies tightly to escape from the freezing air, burying their heads inside as if they were tortoises hiding from danger and fright. Everyone’s eyes were slightly watery, their expressions grim and bitter. The way they moved was with so much rigidness that one could misjudge them as statues. No one stopped in a place for long with the strong wind pushing and shoving at their backs. Where they were going was a mystery to Winston, and apparently a mystery to themselves also. People were desperate to hide from the coldness that any place which emitted a sheath of warmth could be just as welcoming as their own homes. (Even better for some people don’t have heat in their houses).
Winton stared blankly out into the streets, his gaze unfocused and dreamy. Through the glass pane of the café shop, his reflection gazed blankly back at him. Winston looked drastically different from five years ago. He was much fatter now. His hands which used to belong to that of a writer’s, where once delicate and nimble were now thick and clumsy. His face had a pinkish glow from the top of his bald head to the bottom of his lower jaw. His nose was flatter and slightly misshaped because it had been broken during the interrogation. Winston could recognize and understand his surroundings but in the meantime, he was viewing his environment as if gazing through a snow globe. He felt separated and far away. Everyday he would sit in the Chestnut Tree café and drank his way through morning till night, and when he got home, he would drink into oblivion in his bed just to wake up the next day with a pounding headache and an upset stomach. Winston’s solution to this was to drink more until this aching was buried beneath the strong smell of gin. There were no telescreens barking at him to clean up, no stern voices instructing him to bend his back to the maximum when exercising. His movements were no longer analyzed or even watched, to the Party, he had become as irrelevant as the proles. As far as he was concerned, the only times he was watched was when his gin bottle needed refilling.
All this suited Winston just perfectly, there was no need for him to be monitored. Since his release from the Ministry of Love, his thoughts never strayed anywhere away from that of being devoted to the Party and drinking. His whereabouts were solely limited in three places mostly, the Chestnut tree café, his residence at the Victory Mansions, and his sinecure in the Ministry of Truth. He had been moved to one of the countless sub departments that were working on the production of the eleventh edition of the Newspeak dictionary. What he was working on, Winston couldn’t quite put a finger on it. It was something to do with whether commas should go outside of brackets or not, the kind of trivial problems that were safe enough for the likes of Winston to work on. What he did at his old job of rewriting documents required the immense brain power and concentration which he lacked now, as he couldn’t concentrate on one thing for long without feeling an ache in his head. Winston’s current position offered a handsome amount of salary and required little work of him. All he had to do was to go there two or three times a week and sit in front of the table forming a circle with other people who were just like him. Most days they remained silent, Winston would sink into his chair and stare blankly in one spot. There were days when they would suddenly become energized and practically enthralled by their work. People even began to argue, acting like mad men and gesturing rudely toward each other. Winston was one of the loudest, as if seized by a sudden frenzy of madness. His face bloated red as a balloon and spit came out of his mouth when he talked. His volume escalated as his speech droned on to an extent where he didn’t even know what he was talking about. All he felt was anger, so he lashed it out on everything and everyone. But this anger would subside just as quickly as it came. Winston sank back into his chair, tired and confused, back to the state of not thinking again. All his spirits had gone out of him, he was left with nothing but a broken and empty shell.
Unknowingly, Winston’s fingertips traced along the dusty table and wrote down: 2+2=5. Outside, the wind was picking up its speed. Winston watched as people scurried quickly along the streets, his hand was just about to reach for the gin bottle when it came to an abrupt halt. His eyes faltered on a black-haired woman who was passing in front of the glass pane. She was wearing a long sleeved black overcoat, black union pants and a pair of tightly strapped black boots. She walked briskly past the window with her head buried inside the big overcoat. Winston’s hands began to tremor violently. His mouth was in an open with her name on the tip of his tongue. “Julia.” He croaked. He knew that Julia had not heard him for his voice was barely audible even to himself. He made a conscious effort to pull himself out from the seat, but his leg gave way and he promptly fell back into it. “Julia.” This time he used all of his strength to shout out the name. Outside, the black-haired woman stopped in her tracks, pulled her face out from the coat and looked around for the source of the sound. Her gaze finally fell upon Winston and she recognized him. Her eyes swept across Winston from his head to his toe. She was looking at Winston with an air of dislike and despise. “She got fatter,” Winston thought to himself. Julia’s features had changed a lot after her release from the Ministry of Love. Winston recalled the first time they met after their release, how surprisingly stiff her waist had become. Her waist was as stiff as a corpse he once dragged out from a pile of rubbles. He waved at her. Julia didn’t wave back. She merely casted him a quick despising look and a stiff nod of the head before turning away and walking briskly past the café window. With the last strand of her black hair disappearing from view, Winston allowed himself to settle into a more comfortable position in his chair. There was a mixture of feelings suddenly rushing up through him when he caught sight of Julia. This mixture of complex emotions that he couldn’t figure out caused him to yell out her name. What he was trying to accomplish by calling her, he did not know. All he knew was that her name had meant something to him, her face, her body had meant a lot to him, before. With a sudden rush of adrenaline, Winston wanted to run out of the shop and chase after her. He wanted to run and yell her name down the street till he catches up with her. He wanted to make her take a really good look at him, not with dislike but with joy in her eyes. He wanted to… The moment faded like waves retreating the shoreline, washing away his enthusiasm.
They had met two times before today. One was from the beginning when they were released, and the other was perhaps two years after that. Winston’s memory regarding dates had always been unclear and foggy. As he recalled, it was a bright spring afternoon and he was strolling around London aimlessly. His feet carried him to a very familiar place that he had been to. He stopped and looked towards the green patch of meadow. In spring, this place looked beautiful. Winston was feeling very tired, so he walked to the meadow and laid there motionless, not closing his eyes nor looking at anything. Suddenly, a sound of twig breaking made him look back. Julia was walking up to the meadow. She saw Winston and chose a place far apart to sit. For a long time, they were both sitting there without saying a word. The sun was setting, painting the sky red. The light breeze brought flowery scents into the air. Winston was staring at the sky before Julia spoke: “I was hoping to be alone until I saw you here.” He turned and looked at her, under the setting sun, her face glowed pinkish, giving her a soft expression. “Me too.” He said. She gestured to her surroundings, “This is beautiful isn’t it?” “Yes.” Winston agreed. After that they were silent for a long time before Julia broke the silence again. “We can never go back.” She said without looking at Winston. “We can never go back.” Winston said so looking at her. “We have both changed forever.” She paused and looked toward Winston. “We have both changed forever.” He echoed. Winston's eyes welled up and he bent his head down trying to hide it, missing Julia’s action of sweeping away her tears with her hands. Before the sun reached the end of the horizon, Julia got up first and said that she had to catch a train. She walked away without saying goodbye nor looking back. Winston had sat there a little longer, but the chilling air crept up on him and drove him away eventually. After that, Winston had never been to the place again.
A loud screech from the telescreen jolted him back from his remembrance. Everyone stopped amid their chatting and activities, the bartenders stopped in their tracks to deliver more drinks to the customers. People were waiting with their brows furrowed, bitten lips, eyes fixated on the single telescreen. Their faces were of the same expression, grim and solemn as they were waiting for the inevitable bad news. After a second loud screech from the telescreen, a grave voice with a slight quiver spoke out: “Fellow comrades, it is to our greatest sadness to inform you that our troops in the front line has been defeated. Our enemy Eastasia has crossed the front-line barriers. We are now a nation which is more threatened than ever before. This is the time for all of us to unite together and defend our country. Countless brave souls have perished in the fight for our independence…” The speech went on to praise the soldiers who had lost their lives in the fight against the enemy. Already, people were in a state of chaos and disarray. Some men were throwing their fists into the air, swearing loudly; Women were crying in the most dramatic way possible, they gathered in groups like a flock of hens, wailing in despair; Children were running up and down through the streets. Some who were old enough to understand the situation were as pale as a sheet, they wandered about looking terrified. The younger ones were undisturbed by all of this and running freely as they pleased for their parents were finally not restricting their actions. Winston sat in the middle of this chaos, as soon as he had heard the first word of defeat, he had put his bottle down and listened through the entire speech. After it had finished, and people were crying, he sat there in silence. From his outward appearance, there was no suggestion of any emotions. At long last, Winston had decided that this chess game has been going on for quite a long time. He threw the last white piece onto the ground, smacked his lips contently. He looked at his watch, hoping it was not too late to catch the last train to meet a certain someone that has been dancing around the edge of his memory for such a long time. He left the chess game unfinished, the white piece of checker laid on the dusty ground.