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By Steve Caplan

Aug. 31, 1996

It was truly an odd affair. Even now, years after the incident, I still vividly remember the details. It isn't due to my having a good memory or anything like that, but mainly because over the years I have read the letter over and over, never quite allowing it to be released from my consciousness.

During that summer we had been engaged to be married. Our first encounter had been at university out east; it had begun innocently enough when I was tardy for a history lecture and Will had been generous to lend me his excellent notes.

Aside from our mutual Canadian history course, we had only two other classes together, one in Shakespearean literature and the other in mathematics. Will preferred structured courses; he was good at analyzing and thinking out problems, but shied away from creative work. Meanwhile, I preferred the excitement of creating poetry and song. To tell the truth, I had always maintained that Will had superb imaginative talent, but he would laugh and decree, "Sorry, none of that for me".

Our relationship progressed relatively quickly during those months. I often joked about how other women were courted with roses and carnations, while Will courted me with a set of trigonometry formulae.

After exams, we went off to our respective families. At the end of the month I was to have travelled out west by train to meet his family and hopefully find work there in the city for the rest of the summer break.

Since Will's 'down-to earth' behaviour impressed me so much, I was overly curious to meet his younger brother, Micky. By Will's own admission, Micky was far more dynamic and I imagined that they must have contrasted greatly, being brought up together in the same family.

I never did meet Micky, but he has been in sporadic contact with me for several years.

I prefer to reveal the letter; not surprisingly, it is exceedingly clear and well written even though its contents are extremely difficult to stomach. My own feelings about Will's misconception of responsibility don't really matter at this point. The letter is provided here in its complete form:

To all those who may be affected by this letter, first and foremost, my fiancee Julie:

I would like to apologize for any anguish that I may have caused to anyone either in the past (prior to this letter) or any inconveniences now caused by the release of this letter.

It's now two in the morning and I am sitting alone in my room at my parents' home contemplating how this horrid inexcusable business began. I guess that ever since we were young children, my brother and I had always enjoyed practical jokes. The thrill of a good prank would always set my heart on fire; I could feel the blood pumping through my veins to the tune of quick, short, gasping breaths that spelled my anticipation of the potential outcome.

Although I was three years older than Micky, he was always the leader when it came to carrying out these pranks. That's not really true, since I myself had thought up most of the ideas, but would never have had the balls (pardon me) to go through with the operation without my brother. Actually, if I hadn't had a slightly restraining attitude, I think he may have gone way overboard in many instances. It may have been cute and harmless to call people up on the telephone and have a laugh, but letting the air out of car tires in forty below zero weather is in effect quite cruel.

Being several years older, I guess it had always seemed natural that I ensure that Micky didn't do any real damage. On the other hand, I had always been the one to put him up to all these gags. I was always the one to first suggest a prank. We would choke ourselves laughing about the possible outcome of the prank, and then Micky would get impatient, "Come on, what are you waiting for? Let's do it!"

At this point, I'd usually argue half-heartedly, "We can't do that, what if they find out?" In the end he would always pacify me by saying, "Allright, if you're chicken then I'll do it myself. Just stay on the lookout.."

By his answer, the reply of a fourteen year old boy, I know now that he had already learned what I am really discovering only tonight. Perhaps I have hidden from the truth myself, but only now am I fully aware of it.

I'm not sure that I ever showed any responsibility at all. I simply may have used Micky to pull off all those gags that I myself never had the nerve to attempt. All my weak and inevitably ineffective endeavours to dissuade him from doing a certain stunt may well have been an act; I desperately wanted him to do my dirty work. If I had felt any real responsibility or guilt about the gags, I would never have even suggested them. It is certainly true that Micky may have subconsciously used me in the same manner; after all, he could hide under the protective wings of youth. If and when caught, he could always claim that his big brother put him up to the gag. He knew that the older conspirator, (namely me) was far more likely to take the rap for having pulled the prank.

It's easy now to see that it was my fault; in retrospect it's always easier to put the blame on someone. However, I really could have prevented the whole stupid episode if I had really been the solid, responsible citizen that people have been mistaking me for ever since I was eight years old.

A little while ago my brother discovered that when he tuned in to a certain shortwave station on the radio, he could eavesdrop on mobile telephone operators and hear the calls that go through the switchboards. We would laugh ourselves to stitches listening to the innocent, unaware callers in the midst of private conversations. There was the guy who boasted to his friend that he had been cheating on his wife for years, and the caller who surprised his wife by calling from his car parked on the street in front of their house to tell her that he was home. There were romantic stories, people who embezzled money and cheated on their income tax returns, boring people with absolutely nothing to say, and even those who spoke foreign languages so that we never understood a word. I guess that by far the arguments were the most exciting; occasionally there would be cursing and swearing until either the caller or the person at the other end of the line would become angry enough to slam down the phone. After a few seconds the mobile operator would perk up the line by asking, "Mobile, are you through?" This would be met either by continued silence or a rather vehement, "Yes, dammit!"

Well, very quickly we became bored with our new discovery. When you've heard one romantic conversation or one argument, all the others sound remarkably similar. I noticed that during the mobile caller's request to be connected with a given number, we were able to jot down the number. "Wouldn't it be hilarious if we were able to call ahead of the mobile operator and tie up the line for the caller?"

There it was again; my idea, that I was anxious to witness, but would never have carried out. As usual, this was followed by my stern warning that we were becoming actively involved; until now, noone could really blame us for simply listening to something that was broadcast over the radio. However, from this point on (I continued to hypocritically reprimand) we could get into serious trouble. I told him that I was leaving the room and that I didn't want any part of the practical joke that he was about to pull.

I suppose that the silly sermon I delivered was designed to cover me in the event of being caught. However, the whole speech was wasted because when he began to call people and 'warn' them that any second now they would receive a phone call, I became hooked. I reentered the room without a second thought.

As usual, everything progressed. I would jot down the phone number for my brother, and we'd listen to the conversation. Later, he'd call up the person at home and try to disguise his voice as the mobile phone caller who had just hung up. Imagine the surprise when the husband arrives home and his wife greets him with a 'quarter pounder' even though he had specifically asked for a 'Big Mac'. "But you called back and changed your mind, honey, don't you remember?"

"Look, Elaine", her bewildered husband was likely to have reacted, "I don't care if you forgot what I asked for or made a mistake; it really doesn't matter. Just don't try blaming it on me. There are only the two of us here, so let's try and be honest with each other."

Often I'd skip out of the room claiming that 'enough is enough'; it's unfair and really revolting to mess up other people's lives and businesses. This was my insurance policy renewal; I had done my 'best' to stop him, but he just hadn't listened. Inevitably I would be back, and Micky was well aware of this.

My brother got bolder with his practical jokes, until the last one that he played. I felt very badly about his having called a young man to change an appointed meeting with a friend to another location. This was really interfering with innocent people's lives and I wish I had stopped Micky or at least called the man myself (I knew his telephone number, after all) to clear up the mess. However, I had always done the opposite; I 'egged-on' my brother, pushing him to become more and more daring by my weak, self-righteous lectures.

Perhaps my timid, ineffective efforts to dissuade Micky from continuing a certain prank were not really a conscious attempt to urge him on to even more provocative action. Nevertheless, I discovered that in effect, I wasn't driven by any responsibility at all. In fact, I couldn't have cared less for the fate of the guy that Micky had sent to the wrong side of the city to meet his pal. I was only worried about the possibility of being caught. I am not really sure that I even cared very much what would have happened to Micky if that tough, young guy were to have caught him. I must have been far more preoccupied with how something like that would have affected me personally; my parents would blame me for everything, knowing that I should have prevented Micky from exaggerating.

This discovery led me to postulate that the much admired trait that my peers and elders so often confused with responsibility was really only driven by fear. Perhaps it's not easy (for those of you who have born with me for so long) to comprehend the depth of this personal enlightenment. It is reminiscent of the way Samuel Butler's hero felt in "Erewhon or over the range". One realizes that one's best quality or feature, in the eyes of both others and oneself, is that one is afraid.

I knew that Micky shouldn't have gone out that night. I was sure that I had heard subtle clicks on the telephone line all day; having read detective stories, I was convinced that somehow that enraged young man had managed to trace the calls that Micky had made. We both had heard him swear on his next mobile phone call that he would catch Micky and make him pay. It was rather foolish of Micky to call him again and make him even more livid.

I don't think that I managed to sleep at all that evening. When I flipped on the radio just an hour ago and heard that a teenager was shot coming out of a parking lot downtown, I knew that he had been caught.

I am beginning to feel drowsy now; it's the combined effect of the late hour, my earlier fitful attempts to sleep, the spent emotions from telling this story, and mostly from the bottle of chemicals wandering through my bloodstream and into my tissues urging me on into indefinite slumber...

Well, thinking back over the years, William could be credited with a tremendous imagination; the same imagination that had allowed him to think up all those unusual practical jokes. Although the news had broadcast a shooting incident in the city on that fateful night, the wounded youth (who was later released from hospital with only light wounds), with his long red hair and scraggly beard, did not fit Mickey's description. In actual fact, Micky had already driven home to their parents' place, and was already safe and sound, long before Will had even swallowed the pills.

It was Will's obsession with guilt and responsibility that triggered his imagination and cost him his life.

hat was a difficult summer for me. The immediate shock and emptiness left by his death were slowly replaced by a raging anger that has yet to be quelled with the advance of time. He was obsessed with proving that he was a valid, responsible entity.

Well, William certainly proved that he could take ultimate responsibility (for what he had thought was his brother's death); it certainly wasn't fear that drove him to suicide.

Unfortunately, he is not around today to appreciate the responsible status that he acquired. Because in proving himself, he had performed the most irresponsible act imaginable.