This Is Us -- Uncle Nick

Last time, Randall won the election, and Kevin and Zoe moved in with each other. Kevin also discovered Jack knew his brother was alive...

Jack getting his mail. He gets a postcard from Niagra Falls from his brother. He hides it in his desk. He gets another one. And another one. They all go in his desk.

The kids are kids, again. Jack sees a postcard come to his house. He tells Rebecca he has to go out of town.

Kevin breaks the news to the family about Uncle Nick. Kevin says whoever wants to come with him to see Uncle Nick is welcome. Rebecca doesn't want to come. Kate doesn't want to go, either. I think she's having a hard time facing the man she idolized wasn't as perfect as she thought he was.

Beth nervous about job interviews she has. Randall gives her a pep talk. Randall's worried what will happen if they don't find Nick to Kevin. He thinks it'll crush him the same way it would have crushed him if he hadn't found William. Kate changes her mind and decides to go with the boys to meet Uncle Nick.

Duo scenes of Jack heading off to see Nick and Randall, Kevin and Kate leaving to do the same thing. The trio have a good time joking with each other as they drive alone. Randall isn't rattled about Jack's lies because Rebecca lied to him about William.

The girls worry about Rebecca. She makes an excuse to have some time alone when they ponder if Randall will bring Uncle Nick back to live with them. Miguel says she's just tired.

Jack remembering he and Nick when they were kids. Nick lives in a trailer. Kevin walks up to it the trailer. He's more anxious than the other two to meet the mystery man.

Kevin knocks on the door but there's no answer. In the past Jack asks Nick how he got his home address. Kate wants to go as Kevin continues to knock. Jack tells Nick he can't write him at home and to take care. Kevin is peeking in the trailer when Nick shows up and introduces himself. He doesn't know Jack is dead. In the past Nick tries to get Jack to come in for a beer. Jack goes in in the past.

Nick says the trailer is better than the house he once had. He gives Jack pictures from Vietnam. He gets Jack to reminisce about the past.

The kids go into Nick's trailer. Kevin brings up the elephant in the room about Jack saying he died in Vietnam. Nick says they wasted their time coming here and to please leave. Kate says no. She says Kevin traveled around the world and back and they're not going anywhere.

Nick tells them when he got drafted Jack joined to look for him. He says he sampled whatever junk came his way. Jack tried to clean him up. He got pulled out for psychiatric reasons. Nick says Jack should never have come for him.

Back in Nam a little boy is watching him when Nick wakes up after dreaming of finger-shooting several of the Vietnamese villagers. He eats a chocolate bar in front of him. The child actually makes Nick laugh. He invites the child fishing. He takes out a hand grenade when he and the boy are on the boat and throws it in the water to make fish float on the surface to catch them. The next time he does this the grenade drops to the bottom of the boat Nick tries to get the boy to jump as he jumps overboard. Jack hears the explosion and goes swimming out to the boat. The boat is in pieces with no sign of the child. They fish Nick out and he seems to be out of it. Jack grab him asking what did he do, thinking Nick killed the little boy on purpose. Jack says he's done with him. The villagers blame Jack and their men and the mother is hysterical. Nick is sent off to a psychiatric hospital and Jack and his men pull out of the village.

In the present Nick says he never got to tell Jack what really happened. Jack wouldn't let him.

In the past Nick and Jack talking about the past. Nick tries to talk about Nam, but Jack won't let him. He says he doesn't want to go back there. Jack tells him to stop sending letters to his house. He says he can't turn back. Nick asks Jack if he ruined his life. Jack says he has a good life. He shows him a picture of his family. Nick gives the picture back. He promises Jack he won't write him anymore and tells Jack to just go. Jack leaves.

Nick says when Vietnamese women lose someone they'd collapse within themselves. He says that mother's face will never leave him or her wailing. He worries that's the last thing he'll remember when his time comes. Nick says Jack saw everything in black and white, which is why he had two lives. He says Jack put the war behind him and never looked back. The kids tell Nick how Jack died. Nick asks them to leave. Kevin doesn't really want to leave.

Jack returns home to Rebecca. Jack says he lied about where he went. He says he went to see someone he knew from the war. He says it helped a little to go see him. When she says there's people he can go talk to he cuts her off and walks away.

In the present Rebecca tells Miguel they found Jack's brother. She wonders if she could have done more. She wonders why she didn't ask Jack more. Miguel says he didn't know the stuff about Jack before. That he thinks Jack had a darkness inside him he was afraid would get out and affect her and the kids. She says now she wants the truth.

Kevin remembers before Jack goes away to visit Nick saying he wants to go with him, because he loves him more than Randall and Kate do. Jack says not to make the same mistakes he did, before telling Kevin to stay there and leaving. Kevin says he can't leave Nick the way he is. Jack is shown hesitating at the crossroads between going back to Nick and going home and he ultimately decides to write Nick off and go home. At the same crossroads Kevin makes a different choice. He heads back to see Nick. When they go back they find the trailer unlocked. Kevin and the others go in. They see him sitting with a gun on the table. Randall takes it away from him. Nick still upset he never got to tell Jack it was an accident. Kevin places his hand on his uncle's shoulder.

Well, those waiting to find out how the seemingly perfect husband and father wasn't perfect found it out. As devoted as he'd been to his brother when he wrote him off he wrote him off. His deception goes beyond lying to his wife and kids. Since Nick was sent to a psychiatric hospital, the war department wouldn't have sent Nick's parents a telegram saying he'd been killed. That means Jack came back from the war and lied to them that their son was dead. When you think about it what Jack did is pretty heinous. He took his parents right to decide to abandon Nick or not away from them by lying to them that he was dead and he never told them the truth and they must be dead, by now, so it's too late for them to ever find out the truth.