“Why?” Juan searched for a clean spot on the desk to set down his coffee cup. Failing that, he set it down on some older papers that didn’t look vital, “I’ll tell you why. Because I’m angry!”
“About what?” Richard made a show of removing the papers from beneath Juan’s cup, shaking them off, and then stacking them unceremoniously on top of another pile.
Juan scowled, “What they’re doing to Trump is not right. They’re going after him in the courts. They have, like, ninety charges against him!”
“Ninety-one,” Richard corrected.
“Yeah, that’s right,” Juan agreed, throwing his hands in the air. “And they’re all felonies too! That’s crazy! They want to put him in jail until he’s dead. What for? He was the best president we ever had.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Richard replied mockingly. “But I didn’t think Mexicans talked about this stuff.”
“Dammit Richard,” Juan objected, “You come to every one of my parties and drink all my beer. Do you ever listen to us when we’re talking?”
“I guess not,” Richard confessed. “But I can’t help it if my whole social life revolves around your family’s next quinceañera.”
“We think about the same things you do,” Juan picked up the coffee cup and took a sip. He knew that Richard was needling him, but his boss had touched a nerve. Juan didn't want to let the old man get under his skin, and he struggled to keep his emotions under control.
“I’m sorry,” Richard apologized, “we both know I can be a jackass sometimes.” He held up the coffee pot, offering Juan a refill.
“Sometimes?” Juan waved away the re-fill, his cup still nearly full. “Richard, you never say nothing nice. Nobody likes you.”
Richard chuckled. “That’s the way I like it.”
“I know,” Juan had to grin at his cantankerous friend. “But seriously, these elections are all rigged. Can you believe they’re trying to keep Trump off the ballot now? What if I want to vote for him? Some cabrón is not gonna let me? I’m an American citizen!” Juan liked the feeling of pride that statement aroused in him, “I get to vote for who I want, not for who they let me.”
“And you can’t tell me that last election wasn’t stolen!” Richard declared loudly, spilling coffee from his cup onto his desk's disorganized mess of papers. “Voting machines, ballot drop boxes…”
“Stopping the count in the middle of the night,” Juan added, his lip curling, “Then, in the morning, just the right number of votes appearing out of nowhere to change the result. Do they think we’re stupid? Anybody can see what’s going on.”
“If we don’t start fighting back,” Richard warned, “we’ll lose our country to these damned communists.”
“How do we do that?” Juan asked.
"I wish I knew," Richard tried to mop up the sloshed coffee. But it was too late. The damage was done.