Johnny has become particularly vile towards his wife, Jenny. She's been walking on eggshells for weeks. He's been abusive since Aidan's suicide, accusing her of being a two-faced liar for acting like she misses Aidan while not really liking him while he was alive. He yells at her. He calls her names. He throws things at her. And he plans to divorce her and launch a new love affair with his old friend Liz.
There's been another story connected to Aidan that's been brewing for months. Aidan was once engaged to a woman named Eva. They broke up and things were pretty toxic between the two of them for a long time. However, she gradually realized that she was pregnant with Aidan's baby after their break-up and planned to have an abortion.
Meanwhile, her sister Toyah and her husband Peter were having a baby with assistance from a surrogate. Unfortunately, the surrogate had a miscarriage and Toyah couldn't bear to tell Peter. She somehow convinced Eva to not have the abortion and to instead give her unborn baby to her and Peter. They hid Eva's pregnancy and pretended that Baby Susie was born from the surrogate.
It was a huge mess, made worse for all of the lies that Toyah and Eva had to invent to cover up for all of their other lies. It seriously would have made more sense for Toyah to tell Peter about the miscarriage and to arrange for a kinship adoption. But what do I know, right?
Wrong. It turns out that I'm pretty right. Eva struggled with giving up Baby Susie even before the birth, but felt guilted into following through with it. Peter eventually found out about the deception and walked out on Toyah. He told Aidan's sister/his ex Carla, who told Johnny and the rest of the family. The Connors confronted Eva and she admitted that Baby Susie is Aidan's daughter.
By this time, Eva was planning on raising Susie. She told Johnny and the others that they were welcome to come see Susie anytime they want. And Johnny seemed grateful -- at first. But he told Carla and Kate at the end of last night's episode that he plans to contact his attorney and gain full custody of Baby Susie. "No granddaughter of mine is going to be raised by that lying bitch!"
Nice, eh?
I was doing some previews this evening. I actually try to avoid "Corrie" spoilers. I'm normally not spoiler adverse. I guess it's the ongoing nature of soap operas that makes me want to avoid "Corrie" spoilers. But I did it tonight -- and I learned that there's going to be a crazy new "call the social worker" moment next week on "Coronation Street!"
Johnny is going to contact a social worker, who of course is going to rush over to investigate Eva and her baby mess. And I can certainly see some concerning elements in this story. Eva was party to a short-live adoption fraud. She has some income, but largely has no income. But she's largely stable and capable of meeting Susie's needs.
Meanwhile, Johnny is wracked with grief. He's struggling with a degenerative disease (MS) and alcoholic tendencies. He's abusive enough to his wife that others are aware of his behavior. And he's in the middle of an affair that's likely to explode outward.
In other words, I really don't see this working out in Johnny's favor. All he'll manage to do is piss off a lot of people and get himself cut out of Baby Susie's life for the foreseeable future.
Anyway, it will make for an interesting story next week.