It looks like Elaine's world is literally crashing in around her on tonight's episode of Smother on RTÉ One.
Last week’s cliffhanger saw her get her drink spiked by Anna. As a result, she was involved in a traffic accident when she reached for her phone while driving home, inadvertently under the influence.
She swerved at another car - driven by Joe, who was on his way to see Val - causing it to flip over, with Joe ending up slumped at the wheel, clearly injured and possibly dead.
In the aftermath, Elaine will have a lot of explaining to do. Especially to the Garda.
Justine Mitchell, who plays Elaine, takes up the story: "A lot of the episode is her going 'What the hell happened?’
"Because she’s a recovering alcoholic, and having been to AA that day, she just knows it was her intention to be sober that day. She did follow through with that intention.
"So, her only logical conclusion is that her drink was spiked. But she can’t think how or why that would happen."
Given her far from happy relationship with alcohol, the assumption everyone else is making is that she fell off the wagon, took to the drink, and is now facing what could be dire consequences.
"Everyone is so annoyed at her as well,’ says Justine. "Because she’s back on the gargle." Feeling alone, scared and isolated, she’s in a very dark place without a friend or a shoulder to cry on.
"I think she just unmoored completely, and just loses her bearings, can’t figure out what the hell is going on," says Justine, who clearly enjoys playing such a flawed and complicated character.
"And she’s terrified because she’s been making such good inroads with her sons Jacob and Callum. And the eldest, Cal, is not happy at all with her, and you’ll see that in the episode. He’s most unimpressed, for several reasons.
"She spends a lot of the episode trying to figure out who could have done this to her and why, and that plants some ideas in her head. So it’s a really interesting episode."
Given her pivotal role in Smother - it’s no spoiler alert to point out that, at the end of season one, she was revealed to be the person who caused Denis’s death - Justine’s enjoying her time in the show.
Elaine is a classic character in that she’s central to the ongoing saga. And in attempting to cover her tracks, she’s had to resort to creating layers of lies.
"Where she went wrong - killing Denis was a bad decision," she says, stifling a laugh. "She didn’t mean to do it, but when something like that happens in your life, that’s when you can make a choice.
"For various reasons, she’s now got herself in a situation where she’s covering up, oh my god, a ton of toxic fabrication."
Smother, 9.30pm, RTÉ One
