It's the clichéd bright summer afternoon when boy meets girl ... again ... typical characters meeting at a typical local coffee shop, local in their world that is, a world that doesn't exist in reality but does in the head of a writer, a world that exists as long as it is on a page or on a screen and is available for someone else to imagine or see in some sort of adaptation. And these coffee shop meetings so often take place with seats by the window so they can see the imaginary world outside.

A strange thought could be as is to what could these characters do or what do they do when their writer is away and not dealing with the story that involves them at a time when that writer could actually do with sitting down and spending an hour or two writing the actual story that involves these characters instead of being distracted by scrolling through Facebook or watching videos on YouTube or responding to some Tweet or other?

After all, these characters have lives too, made up lives but lives all the same.

'We get a union going ... that's what we should do...' calls out the strong handsome young man who has a strong belief that he is above everything, the ego who believes himself to be the center of the universe or who actually might be the usually quiet shy introvert fellow who feels underwhelmed, not deserving to be in the company of a beautiful lady with curves in all the right places and the belief that her popularity is at an all-time high or the lady who should be all that and doesn't believe herself to be worthy of the glory given to her in words.

'You know, we don't cease to be just because the person who believes they have invented us also believes they suffer from a thing called writer's block ... geez ...' she says while twisting her long straight blonde hair around a finger or perhaps her hair is actually dark and curly.

Many a writer might tell a non-writer that any given story might just write itself as the characters more or less decide what they want to do and the writer just lets them be, him or herself just being a vessel for a story to travel through. If the characters are to do anything at all, do they actually need a writer to prove it?

'No ... she's right ... not as in write but as in right. We don't cease at all; we characters need to sort something out. We can't just sit around and do nothing and wait while our coffees go cold waiting for our writer's Wi-Fi to collapse or something.'

Yeah, characters, no matter how they are created or who creates them ... once they exist ... they exist. They don't stop existing when a story ends or when a writer is away, even when they die. Is there a character purgatory somewhere in existence where all imaginary people wander about no matter from where or when they came? Imagine Macbeth interacting with Inspector Gadget before such a time comes when one or other is watched or read, consumed by those who consume characters and stories.

Wouldn't a union for characters naturally exist? It wouldn't need a writer in order to be created but then again wouldn't such a union need to interact with writers the world over? Pay attention to your character or the union will sanction a strike, many strikes ... we the character refuse to conform ... how's that for potential writer's block?

There would be no need for the average character to demand respect, would there? We naturally do respect characters whether we write them, read about them, or view them on screen or on some sort of stage production. If they demand respect, we could either give it or have them killed?

'We're real God Damn it. Don't kill me with your pen or keyboard. How would you like it if I threw my coffee right at you?'

Yeah, a Union would prevent death but then again characters in popular stories never truly die so long as the story they are in is popular but then again, that ensures that death is eternal. Ah, to Hell with it all. It's back to my cold coffee and my seat by a window of an unknown coffee shop on an average bright summer's day ...