Coronation Street legends broken after a death – and a huge secret threatens to make things worse
A huge secret is on the exposure in Coronation Street, that could make Billy Mayhew’s (Daniel Brocklebank) grief over the death of husband Paul Foreman (Peter Ash) a whole lot worse.
Monday’s episode saw Paul’s motor neurone disease journey come to a close after his initial diagnosis almost 18 months ago.
We’ve seen his condition steadily grow worse during that time, first losing his mobility, and later struggling to speak.
Unfortunately for Billy, he’d spent their last night together out with the lads as the family rallied round to give him a break. Returning home drunk, he had one hell of a hangover the next morning and realised he’d lost his phone.
Fearful that the pictures, videos and memories of Paul would be lost forever after not backing them up into cloud storage, he and David Platt (Jack P. Shepherd) set out to find it.
During their frantic search, back at home, Paul was quickly deteriorating and Bernie (Jane Hazlegrove) couldn’t reach Billy to tell him.
After hearing the news, Billy wondered how he would make it to the hospital in time – especially when the carpark became congested due to a broken down van at the exit.
He realised that his only option would be to make his way there on foot, and as he raced through the streets, Paul passed away.
Billy stopped for a breath, picking up his phone and asking to speak with his husband. Bernie, thinking she was doing the right thing, told him that Paul was still alive and listening.
In Last night’s episode, the clan tried to deal with their loss.
Paul’s twin sister Gemma (Dolly-Rose Campbell) broke the news to her infant children, whilst Billy couldn’t bring himself to leave the house.
Billy was broken by the loss (Picture: ITV)
Bernie was already at Shuttleworth’s Funeral Parlour planning his final journey, and Todd Grimshaw (Gareth Pierce) couldn’t help but wonder whether she’d consulted Billy on any of the plans.
After being coaxed out of his flat, he became full of emotion again in the cafe when realising that was the first place he’d met Paul.
Taking some comfort in knowing that his beloved heard his voice in the final moments of his life, he asked Summer how he responded.
Too stunned to tell him the truth, she struggled for words before Todd stepped in and said he was sure that he was happy. Back at the flat, he continued to plague Summer for information, before Bernie agreed and said that he had a smile on his face.
With everyone fussing over Billy and Bernie, they ended up rowing and snapping over their collective grief.
Todd attempted to make them to stop arguing and work together, but as Billy storms out, he learnt the truth about the phone call.
Later in the episode, after some soul searching, the pair agreed to put their differences to one side – but something tells us there’s going to be a lot more hurt coming.
Will Todd be the one who exposes the shocking lie?
