Season two opens with Jack Pearson staying at Miguel's following a formal separation, the teenage Big Three told only that their parents are "catching their breath." When Rebecca arrives to reconcile, Jack stops her with a confession: he's been hiding a serious drinking problem for years and has been drunk for weeks. Rebecca refuses to let him face it alone. The episode then cuts to a flash-forward of the family home as a burned ruin, Rebecca screaming in her car with Jack's possessions beside her — establishing the fire as the season's central mystery. In the present, Randall pushes Beth toward adopting a newborn until Rebecca reveals Jack once did the same to her; Beth redirects them toward an older child. Kate bails on a singing audition, triggers a confrontation between Kevin and Toby over who is her primary support, then returns alone and ge ...