"Энди Макнаб. Немедленная операция (engl) " - читать интересную книгу автора

I wanted so badly for somebody to come in; I wanted the police to know
that I wasn't bad; I'd fucked up, but it was the other two's fault.
My heart was pumping. I wanted my mum. It was the same horrible feeling
in the pit of my stomach that I'd had running home from Maxwell's Laundry.
I had visions of ending up in Borstal or prison or being the new young
meat in an overcrowded remand wing. I'd always looked up to the local
characters who'd been in prison, and I thought they were really hard.
Now I knew that they must have hated it, too. All their stuff about
"being inside" must have been hollow bravado; it wasn't glamorous, and it
wasn't exciting. It was horrible.
When my parents came up to the police station and I saw the shame and
disappointment in my mums eyes, I thought: Is this it? Is this what I'm
going to be doing for the rest of my life? Having a cell door slammed behind
me, was bad enough; it was claustrophobic and lonely in there, and I was
very scared. But I'd never seen Mum like that before, and I felt terrible.
I decided I was going to change. Alone in the interview room I said to
myself: "Right, what am I going to do? I'm going to start getting myself
sorted out."
There had been one brief spell at school when I'd really got into
English. I did a project on Captain Scott and got an A. I thought it was
really great, but then I just dropped it. I got into history for a short
while and enjoyed making a model of an Anglo-Saxon village.
Maybe I could make a go of it. I didn't want to land up as just another
local nutter who thought he was dead cool because he had a Mark III Cortina
and a gold chain around his neck.
So what was I going to do? There was no way I could get a decent job in
South London. Academically I wasn't qualified, and certainly I didn't have
the aptitude to work in a factory.
In the back of my mind there had always been ideas about the army.
When my uncle Bert had lived upstairs, I'd heard him talking to my mum
once about the army.
He'd joined just before the Second World War because they were going to
feed him three meals a day. And I knew they educated you because my mum had
said so about my brother. Aunties and uncles would say, "John's away now."
My parents would reply, "Oh, yes, make a man of him."
I'd seen all the adverts for the army-blokes on windsurfers who always
seemed to have loads of money, going places and doing stuff.
And at least it would educate me. Why not do three years, I thought,
and see what it's like? My brother had enjoyed it, so why not me? If nothing
else, it would get me out of London.
As soon as the interview started, I said, "Please, I don't want to be
in the shit because I want to join the army. It wasn't my idea going in the
flat. I was just dragging along. They told me to keep dog. Then they came
running out, and I ran with them," And I kept on bubbling.
I got put into a remand hostel for three days while I waited to go in
front of the magistrates. I hated every minute of being locked up, and I
swore to myself that if I got away with it, I'd never let it happen again. I
knew deep down that I really would have to do something pretty decisive or
I'd end up spending my entire life in Peckham, fucking about and getting
fucked up.