Past tense, as in now for us. After all I remember 1984 is about a totalitarian dictatorship of the future. But we still don't have as much cruelty and the continuous fear of thought crime as there was in the novel. We still feel fairly free and when it comes to Winston Smith he was more pessimistic about socialism and sort of longed for the past a kind of private property longing and privacy in general, and even though he kept a little hope in the paroles, he was still was way too pessimistic about the future. Orwell was channeling a bit in himself in Winston.
Winston was afraid Julia might report him for thought crime. That's why otherwise he did wanted a lot to be loyal to her. He did not like his previous wife and want to through her off from somewhere, I don't remember now. ||Though yeah I remember when Winston met O Brien he already said about betraying, lying and breaking all loyalties, though I don't remember exactly if he mentioned Julia, but I remember breaking all ties to rebel against big brother.
What happens in the end is just way too cruel. For both of them Julia and Winston, I mean ||
