Roger slotted the 1950-D penny (minted a year before him) 
and warily twisted the silvery knob. The dispenser lived
up to its balky reputation when the crank froze halfway
through its prescribed arc. Roger jiggled and
rattled the mechanism. It stayed stubbornly stuck.
He seized the painted iron neck and shook, then
cussedly smacked the upside-down glass bowl
brim full of brightly-hued, marble-sized balls.

"Tease," he accused it darkly, shaking sting out of
his hand.

His uncle had flung that epithet at Roger's new aunt --
Hailey by name -- this very morning, and although
the boy cared nothing whether Uncle Chris "got any,"
he yoked the woman's come-hither exterior and her 
failure to put out with the mulish gumball machine
before him.

Uncle Chris had grabbed his prickly bride around the
waist and kicked their bedroom door shut so Roger
wouldn't see the show. But he'd heard their scuffling
and the familiar claps of his uncle's callused hand
on bare butt. A dose of that beefy, whapping palm
changed minds, he knew from experience. He'd clenched
in sympathy as feminine sobs and weepy "I give! 
I'm in the mood, I'm in the mood, Christy,"
reached his young ears in the kitchen.

Roger bolted for school before the "happy couple" got
down to marital business, but all day he'd felt a
dirtiness inside. If being a man meant acting so
low-down and forcing your way on people, he never
wanted hair on his chest. He angrily kicked the
gum-machine pole.

"Hey, Roger. No use abusing the poor thing. You
plannin' on battering it into submission?" Officer Rusby,
the town foot patrolman stepped up behind him,
an amicable eyebrow quirked at him.

"It sucked in my money, Mr. Rusby."

"Been known to happen, eh? We all pays our money
and takes our chances. Today you got the short end
of the stick." Rusby loved talking in cliches.

The man with the badge jammed his hand into a
trouser pocket and fished out a copper cent *and*
a cellophane-wrapped rainbow jawbreaker. "Here, Roger,
compensation for your trouble. And I'll ask Mr. Colby
to fix this machine or remove it. No use it beckoning
to youngsters if it can't fulfill its obligations."
He winked and started down Western Avenue. But he
wheeled about after a few steps. "Roger," he said,
"Remember. A real man doesn't use his fists or even
his open hand as a bad-tempered bullying tactic. Not
on gumball machines or on anything or *anyone* else.
Okay, son?"

Roger hurried to catch up Officer Rusby and they
ambled together in contented silence.

That night at supper, Uncle Chris boxed Roger's ear
when he accidentally jogged gravy from its boat. And when
Hailey (privately, Roger couldn't quite manage her as
"Aunt Hailey" yet) rose to get more biscuits, his uncle
whomped her skirted (still sore?) backside just for 
the hell of it.

Roger zoned out the role model still at table. He
pictured Mr. Rusby and couldn't wait for manhood
after all. 

_________________________________

SSC '04, "Compensatory Acts, circa 1961," [CHILD],
by Rhosymedre (rhosymedre at usa dot com), 500 words.