Tonight’s episode of Coronation Street featured Paul Foreman’s tragic passing due to motor neurone disease.
However, in a sad turn of events, Paul’s (Peter Ash) spouse Billy (Daniel Brocklebank) was unable to keep his commitment to be by his side till the very end.
Having spent the previous evening out with the lads, after Paul encouraged him to do so, a hungover Billy woke up to realise he had lost his phone, much to Paul’s amusement.
Bernie (Jane Hazlegrove) assured Billy that she and Summer had everything covered so that Billy could head out and find his phone, containing precious memories of his time with Paul that hadn’t been backed up for over a year.
Billy gave Paul a quick kiss goodbye, not realising that it would be the last time he ever saw him alive.
Soon after Billy left, Summer realised that Paul was struggling to breathe and that his lips were turning blue. She and Bernie quickly hooked up his nebuliser but it wasn’t helping, with Summer forced to call an ambulance.
Paul’s brother Kit (Jacob Roberts) soon arrived on the scene, but no one was able to get hold of Billy. As Paul began coughing up blood, Bernie realised that her son was fading fast, and Kit resolved to go and find Billy.
When Paul was finally loaded into the ambulance, twin Gemma (Dolly-Rose Campbell) arrived to accompany him.
Billy in the meantime teamed up with David (Jack P Shepherd) and the two retraced their steps to the Chariot Square Hotel, where they found Billy’s phone smashed in the car park. Realising he could simply swap the SIM over, the pair then headed over to Freshco to pick up a new phone.
Kit used his detective skills to track down Billy just as he began to receive the slew of panicked messages on his phone. When Bernie finally got through to Billy, she told him that Paul was now at the hospital and to get there fast.
However, Kit then found his car had been blocked in, with a traffic jam now blocking the Freshco car park. Realising he had no other option, Billy had to make a run for it.
“I thought he was just going to slip away in his sleep,” Gemma observed as she sat in the waiting room at Weatherfield General with Bernie, Summer and Chesney (Sam Aston). “Next to Billy where he belongs,” Summer added.
“That’s what we all wanted love,” Bernie responded. “But I guess death had other ideas, the miserable sod. Couldn’t just give him a peaceful end, no, he had to stick the knife in one last time.”
They were then given the grave news that Paul had numerous blood clots on his lungs, and as a result his oxygen was at a critical level. With his heart failing, the doctor advised them to say their goodbyes now.
A tearful Summer sat at Paul’s bedside first, telling him that this isn’t goodbye. She knew that he would be with her every single day looking out for her, like a proper dad.
Bernie then encouraged Gemma to say a few words, who asked Paul to come and visit her, and give her a sign to let her know that it was really him.
“When it’s my time, come and find me, yeah?” Gemma then added. “Cos we’re a pair, I’m going to feel like an odd sock without you. Love you bro.”
Bernie kept a brave face as she then kissed Paul on the forehead, telling him it was time to reach for the stars.
“Thank you for being the most wonderful son,” she said. “And I don’t want you to worry, because I’m gonna look after everyone, okay? I’m going to look after our Gemini, and little Summer, and your Billy.”
Realising that Paul was minutes from the end, Summer called Billy on the phone. Momentarily stopping his run to answer, an exhausted Billy asked if he was too late, but Summer assured him that Paul was there and wanted to hear his voice, putting him on speakerphone.
However, in a cruel twist of fate, just as Billy was about to start talking, Paul took his final breath.
As a devastated Bernie and Summer looked on, Gemma picked up the phone again only for Bernie to stop her. Making a split-second decision to protect Billy from further heartache, Bernie told her to let Billy say goodbye.
“It’s okay, he’s listening,” Bernie said down the phone as Gemma looked at her in shock.
As Billy gave a heartfelt speech to his husband, one that he would never hear, Bernie, Summer and Gemma desperately tried to stifle their devastation.
When Billy asked if Paul could still hear him, Bernie told him to carry on.
“I love you Paul,” Billy gasped. “And I am going to miss you every day for the rest of my life. Even though I know how it ends, I would do this a million times over. Being with you, and loving you, it’s been the best thing that has ever happened to me. So just hold on, okay, I’m coming.”
With that, Billy hung up and carried on running, as Bernie, Gemma and Summer finally broke down and let their grief consume them.
As music swelled, we saw Billy arrive at the hospital and be directed to Paul’s room, where he realised he was too late.
Although for the moment Billy can take the smallest amount of comfort in believing that he spoke to Paul over the phone on his deathbed, the guilt of not being there for his final moments will take its toll…
“Oh, he feels horrific,” Daniel Brocklebank told and other media at a press screening of the episode last week. “He’s been cheated out of those final goodbyes and those moments. And he feels guilty about his own stupidity.”
“He got drunk, he lost his phone, he chose to go out the night before. So there’s some mixed emotions. He’s angry with himself, he feels guilty that he wasn’t there to say goodbye to Paul.”
Bernie, Gemma and Summer will also have to deal with keeping their devastating secret from Billy, that Paul never heard his final goodbye.
“I think it’s the only thing really that’s stopping him from tipping off the edge,” Daniel shares. “Because he feels terribly guilty that he wasn’t there, and I think it’s the only thing really holding him together.”
If the tension of that wasn’t enough, Billy and Bernie are inevitably going to face conflict in the coming weeks as they try and organise a send-off befitting Paul.
“They are obviously quite different in their approach to life, and therefore death as well,” Daniel explains. “They’re both grieving for somebody that they love, but both of them think they’ve got dibs on the grief stakes. One’s a mum, one’s a husband.”
“Billy’s very traditional, you know. Billy wants hymns, Bernie wants pop songs. Billy wants a hearse, Bernie wants something else. There is confliction over the next few weeks.”
Sadly Paul’s demise also means that Daniel and his fellow actors will no longer have the pleasure of working with Peter Ash, who has portrayed Paul for the last six years.
“We’ve been building up to this moment for 18 months,” Daniel continues. “So when we got that final block in, it was like, ‘Oh my god, we’re here’. It felt so far ahead in the future when we were first initially pitched the storyline. So for us as characters, it was harrowing.”
“But for us as actors, we shot everything pretty much chronologically. The scene where Billy arrives and holds on to Paul, who’s obviously already passed, was Pete’s last scene. So we knew that when that moment happened, Pete was going to be leaving. So whilst the characters were grieving Paul, we were grieving Pete!”
