DAVID ASHTON
You can learn a lesson from me, Frankie. There can't be all that many fellows that have landed themselves twice.

FRANK COX
Twice?

DAVID: Yeah. That's how I came to get married in the first place. Sefton Park...Sheila. She said, "I'm pregnant," just like that. "I'm pregnant." I felt like being sick on the grass.

FRANK
God.

DAVID
We're all right, though, Sheila and me. We used to slang each other a bit at first, you know, but we were all right in the end, you know. It's not a natural life, this, for a bloke, you know. Not a married bloke. There'll be plenty like me if this lot gets going.

FRANK
Yeah, but a lot that don't do other, Dave.

DAVID
Don't get the chance, you mean.

FRANK
No, I mean just don't. Wives and kids, and so on.

DAVID
Are you lecturing me?

FRANK
Maybe. You said I could learn.

DAVID
I didn't say you could teach me. Not me. No, I know me...how I am. I mean, you know, Sheila's fine...only she's not here, is she? I mean, it's not just down to the other, you know. It's...well, it...you know, they look up to you, women. A woman makes you feel somebody.

 

(from "The Summer Before the War" by John Finch)