I didn’t have a lot of time to think about Errol Clark going home with no one to look after him or being frightened, or what was happening when he came to school. I punched him in the face as he tried to whack me with the metal pipe. The clatter as it hit the pavement set off a reaction – my arm was bruised and the blood moved from my head into my chest. I could still use the arm and tried to grab him but he slipped out backwards and found a milk bottle he brought down on the side of my face. I was distracted by the glass smashing on the pavement, I didn’t realise it cut my cheek and tore open my ear lobe and there was blood streaming out. I’d gone down on one knee on top of him but he picked himself up and ran. I jumped up over broken glass to go after him, but a grown-up grabbed me from behind under my arms and pressed my head down so I couldn’t move. I thought it was one of his big people and lashed out backwards with my foot against his shin. It hurt him but all he did was tighten the pressure down on my neck so I had to go limp. Errol Clark came back to give me a kick but the man swung me round away from him and shouted, ‘Oi!’ It turned out to be a man from the Lord Clyde pub who could fight because he let go one arm and grabbed Errol Clark by the collar, knocking the legs out from under him and pushing us both down on the ground. I saw my blood dripping on to the pavement and there was a look on Errol Clark’s face like he’d won and I’d got the worst of it. I struggled to get him but it was over, the man pushed my face down into the blood and I ended up in hospital.

I had stitches in my ear and a padded plaster over my cheek. I felt I could face Patrick again, but he didn’t say anything and he wasn’t going to. I felt like a walking bandage and I wasn’t going to talk about it to anyone, either.