Sorry to everyone who tried to convince their friends which existing This Is Us character Uncle Nicky would marry. All those theories (Rebecca! Candace!) were nonsense. Instead, the love of Uncle Nicky's life turned out to be a stranger to everyone in the Pearson clan, and to fans — which, honestly, is probably for the best.

In Season 6's second episode, titled "One Giant Leap," Rebecca and Miguel are fed up with Nicky talking about Sally, aka the cool, Woodstock-bound photographer who he crushed on while they were both volunteering at an animal shelter. Rebecca tells Nicky that he has to put up or shut up — and so, the group ventures to find Sally, who lives just a few hours away from Los Angeles.

Nicky, who hadn't reached out to Sally before arriving at her front doorstep, more or less weirds her out — but eventually, the group settles in for a somewhat awkward dinner at her home. Sally is married, but unhappily so, and at the dinner declares as much to her husband. While one could be forgiven for assuming that Sally will leave her spouse and run off with Nicky, that's not what happens. Nicky, who found a picture of him on Sally's wall of photos, is content with knowing he put himself out there, and realizes that while he and Sally weren't long lost loves, thinking of her gave him hope that maybe "something good" would happen to him down the line. It's then that he decides he's done with California, and heads back to the east coast to oversee the building of Kevin's new cabin.

It's on his plane back to the east coast that Nicky meets the real love of his life: Edie, who is his flight attendant and instructs him to put the seat in the upright position prior to takeoff. (Nicky, being Nicky, obviously gives her a hard time.) The show then flashes forward to that final scene in the new Pearson cabin, revealing that Edie and Nicky are happily married, and that Edie is mysterious person getting out of the car. (Which, side bar — does not bode well for Kate.)

There was pretty much no way to predict that Nicky would end up with a flight attendant, but it's probably for the best. After all, did we really want Miguel to die, and Nicky to connect with Rebecca? Though that was a popular theory, that would be, well, weird for everyone involved. Same goes for Cassidy, Nicky's friend from his trailer park days, who previously slept with Kevin — and is still in the running to be Kevin's future wife.

Maybe it's better that Nicky's love is someone brand new: It certainly fits with last season's theme that people who are strangers to us can become more important that we ever could have predicted, given some time.

Welcome to the fam, Edie! We're thrilled to have ya.