Rereading Nineteen Eighty Four – Part III Chap. 6 (12)

Winston did not attempt to kiss Julia, nor did they speak.  As they walked  she looked directly at him for the first time.

It was only a momentary glance, full of contempt and dislike. He wondered whether it was a dislike that came from the past or whether it was inspired also by his bloated face and the water that the wind kept squeezing from his eyes.

They sat  on two iron chairs, side by side but not too close together. He saw that she was about to speak.

She moved her clumsy shoe a few centimetres and deliberately crushed a twig. Her feet seemed to have grown broader, he noticed.

‘I betrayed you,’ she said baldly.

‘I betrayed you,’ he said.

She gave him another quick look of dislike.

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It seems clear that whatever sexual attraction they had for each other, whatever sexual emotions existed, had been removed.   They were physically changed due to the torture, but more, mentally crushed so that whatever existed in them which had any spark of individuality that could love or even care about another, was gone.