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still at the stealing. Irene never knew what I was up to. She was a trained typist and had a steady job at Littlewoods Pools in Birkenhead. I loved her, but I couldn’t seem to go straight, even though I tried. We moved into a flat, and Johnny and his girlfriend moved in. It was cramped, but it was a reasonable set-up. Even so, I was out more nights than I care to remember, either nicking, or going with other girls. Then Irene fell pregnant. I felt knocked sideways. We were so young. My mum said we should only marry if we loved each other, and should only have kids if we wanted them.
    We married in 1970, but her parents didn’t come – what an insult. Her dad didn’t like me.
    We lived with my parents for a while and I got a job with my dad’s firm, painting bridges, steel works and petrol tanks. There was nothing I wouldn’t climb topaint. It was exciting work – lots of heights. And I was excited to get home to see my Irene, too. Soon we would have our own home; we were already on the council list.
    She was about six months gone when we got an invitation to a party. I didn’t know anyone there, and I’m glad I didn’t. The guys seemed posh, giggling and chuckling like schoolgirls. I wanted to leave but Irene didn’t.
    There was plenty of going up and down stairs, so I had a look in some of the bedrooms. They were just freaked out; some were naked. It was like some scene from a hippie film.
    Someone passed me a joint and before long I had dropped a few pills and sunk some beers. My head was gone. Their faces seemed all twisted and everything was floating around me. Then it went black. I was flat on my back, with people crowding around me, looking down. What a state! I was helped home in a van to my parents’ place and dumped on the doorstep. Irene never forgave me for that. Mum wasn’t too pleased either. I’d let her down again.
    I was only 19 when our son Michael was born, but it was a great feeling. I’d had a row at work and got the sack, but I was good at the painting lark and soon got another job. I felt I was beginning to settle. Wife, son, and now a council house as well as a car. It wasn’t on a very good estate, but we were doing well for a couple of teenagers. I felt proud pushing the pram down the street. The problem was that Irene and I were drifting slowly apart. We loved each other but we seemed to have so little in common. And here we were facing the next 50 years together. We started rowing; I started going out and working away. And all too soon I was back to Risley, back in a stinking cell. I pleaded guilty at Chester Crown Court to a smash-and -grab – and the judge gave me the biggest chanceof my life. I listened to every word he said. I was free, it was time to sort myself out. I had a suspended sentence over my head when I could easily have been sent down.
    Irene was crying on the way back home and that night I lay awake beside her, thinking. I still felt trapped; I imagined bars on the windows and the door locked and bolted.
    Grandad – my mum’s dad – died soon after. He was liked and loved by so many. We were all so upset. I’d just been given my big break by a judge and now I was about to blow it. Don’t ask me why, but I went out and got a shotgun and sawed the barrel off. Then I got a replica pistol.
    Here I was, good at my self-employed painting work, and with a reasonable amount of money coming in, and I was about to throw it all away. I felt unsettled, unhappy at home. I was going out clubbing, meeting villains. But there was no real excuse. I was 21 now. It should have been time to put childish ways behind me.
    Instead, I went on the week-long mission of madness that earned me seven years at Chester Crown Court in 1974.
    I didn’t know it then, but my time inside would almost double before I finally – and all too briefly – tasted freedom.
    The gates of my personal hell were opening.
     

CHAPTER TWO
    The first thing that hits you when you’re banged up with