Free A Pocketful of Holes and Dreams by Jeff Pearce Page B

I found myself feeling exactly the same as I had when I was on the back of Dad’s wagon, or standing in front of the wash house guarding the prams.
    Barry’s words rang through my head, as clearly as if he was standing next to me: ‘Attack, Jeff. Attack is the best form of defence.’ Then I just steamed in, hitting Cole as many times as I could in the face, the ribs, the chest – anywhere I could land a punch. As my knuckles made contact with his nose, pressing it flat against his face, I felt the warm stickiness of his blood on my fist. It spurred me on, and I continued to lash out until suddenly he fell to the ground, curling up in a ball to protect himself, his arms around his head.
    ‘Kick him! Kick him!’ the spectators urged. ‘Kick him hard, Pearce!’
    But Cole had had enough and was crying out, ‘No more! No more!’ The fight was over. Out of breath, I stood there, looking down at Cole on the ground. I couldn’t quite believe it – it really was all over! I was unscathed, not even one punch hitting me, while Cole lay in a small huddle at my feet. My supporters crowded around me, raising my hands into the air, as if I was the victor in a world-title fight.
    After defeating Cole, I automatically replaced him in the pecking order as fourth cock, but although I liked the title, I didn’t want to have to fight every other day to keep it, preferring to keep my head down. I got into enough trouble, both in and out of school, and I wasn’t planning on looking for any more!
    One thing that really did save me from getting into trouble was ice skating. Dad’s oldest sister, Aunty Doris, worked at the Silver Blades ice rink, which was about three miles from our house, and one afternoon she came by with two free tickets for Sheila and me. The following Sunday, the two of us entered a whole new world, and we both fell in love with it. Seeing how much we enjoyed it, after that, Aunty Doris tried to get us tickets as often as possible. It certainly stopped me spending so much time just hanging around on street corners with a gang of lads, just looking for something to do.
    The poorer areas of Liverpool, like any big city, were also the roughest, where crime flourished. Smaller boys were encouraged to follow in the footsteps of the older lads, starting with petty theft before graduating to more serious crimes. It was almost an accepted part of growing up, and the lads I knocked around with were no exception. We started off with unlocked cars and the backs of lorries, on the lookout for anything worth nicking, then it’d be small shops. If you managed that, it meant promotion to the more profitable targets – people’s houses.
    I was pulled in too, on a couple of occasions, but I had a permanent sick feeling at the bottom of my stomach whenever we were up to no good. I liked my friends and wanted to be accepted as part of the gang, but this wasn’t the way it was going to happen. It just wasn’t for me. If the truth be known, the prospect of being found out and punished by my mother was far more terrifying than being bullied by the kids on the street for not joining in!
    Sheila and I started to make new friends at the ice rink, which made going there even more fun. I teamed up with a boy called Bernie Snagg who, like me, had been on the verge of falling in with the wrong crowd. He and I would meet up there on Sunday afternoons and Wednesday nights. I still kept all my jobs, running errands for Mrs Gilbert every afternoon after school and working Saturday mornings at the wash house. Even if I had wanted to, with all this going on, I wouldn’t have had time to get into trouble!
    We would have skated all day every day if we’d had the money, but because the ice had to be resurfaced and refrozen at intervals throughout the day, there were three sessions at weekends and during school holidays, so to skate all day, you had to pay three times. It took us a while, but we came up with a plan.
    There was a balcony on the