Big Brother’s Fall

“When the Screens Went Dark” They said the clocks had stopped at thirteen, but we remembered twelve. Somewhere in the cracks between slogans, truth lingered like a forbidden song. The telescreens blinked lies into our eyes, but we blinked back, until the flicker grew contagious. We were shadows in alleys, names erased, but our silence grew teeth. Winston was a ghost by then— a story whispered over rationed gin, a martyr without a grave. They rewrote him, just like they rewrote love, and war, and peace. But memory does not bleed ink. We wrote on walls with our breath. We tapped truth in Morse on rusted pipes. We dreamed in defiance, and woke with clenched fists. Then the screens went dark. No explosion. No angel descending from the clouds. Just a hum of wires dying. And in the silence— laughter. The children asked, "Who was Big Brother?" And no one remembered clearly. Only that he watched, and we stopped watching back. The statues cracked in the sun. The slogans peeled like old paint. And from the rubble, we built gardens, and told stories where love was not a crime.