We shift our focus to Phil's Crevasse Paladin; he's in the front with Georgia while Mike, Iris, Deanna, Meredith and Robin are in the rear seats. As they head to Chapel Hill to lay Elly to rest, Georgia asks a question that has been on her mind since the service:
"Who was that piece of white trash John was making goo-goo eyes at? I mean, it was bad enough that he made that horrible speech about mostly missing Elly's rotten cooking but to be so blatant about replacing her as quickly as that, well...."
Iris replied "I think it was that girl Kortney that Elly chickened out on firing after April caught her up to no good; what had happened was that the little idiot helped her boyfriend steal from Elly's business. As I recall, Kortney had gotten her check-kiting aunt to help her snow dim old Elly into thinking that April's concerns were baseless. Fortunately for April and everyone else, Elly had the sense to hire that nice Moira Kinney who volunteers at the Senior's Centre on Wednesday evenings; what she did is get her police constable nephew and his friends take a good look at the little idiot. Once Elly went on vacation and was no longer around to be fooled, Kortney got canned and arrested."
Mike looked at Iris with alarm and asked "Didn't this girl threaten to beat the snot out of April? What's Dad doing with someone like that?"
Deanna frowned and muttered "Doing everything but looking out for his children."
Iris smirked and said "What Deanna is trying to say is that John has this nasty habit of thinking that you, Liz and April are trying to defy him when you're just trying to live your lives; it comes from his fear of being revealed to be irrelevant. The sad thing is that his self-importance, need to be flattered and naivete makes him liable to believe sob stories from nasty people with something to either hide or to sell; he's why you can't cheat an honest man. People who tell him truths he doesn't feel like hearing are 'bad' while con artists who flatter him are 'good'."
Mike sighed and whispered "Don't I know it" before asking "What I want to know is why her; it's not as if there aren't single women his own age he could date. Why rob the prison cradle?"
Phil laughed and said "Well, since there ARE kids in the car, I won't answer THAT question but, well, we all know the answer."