I’ve heard a lot of writers say that when they’re working on a novel, their characters are always with them. Their characters ride around on their shoulders, whispering in their ears until their stories are down on paper. It’s a good reason, they say, to make sure you’re writing characters you won’t mind living with for a few years. Even when you’re not expressly working on the book, they’ll be at the corners of your mind. I’ve often doubted this would be the case with me, I suppose because I imagined this kind of absorption as a constant longing for the pen or the keyboard, an unending flow of ideas. I’d written a “novel” before–a disastrously autobiographical string of words written by the enforcement of quotas and deadlines that is now in a box under my bed where the cat has most likely puked on it–and I never felt that way. I had to force myself to write more words, not because the story needed them, but because I was determined to write a book-length work. My characters were my family members, thinly disguised, and the only one who seemed to follow me around was, predictably, based on me.

Now that I’m a more experienced writer and committed to a novel that is 100% fictional, I understand what those writers mean. My characters will sit quietly in my brain for hours, even days, until something triggers them and they start talking to me. For long stretches they won’t say a thing, but I often think of them when passing a shop window or listening to the radio: Molly would look good in that, James would hate this song. When we do get together, we can spend hours in each other’s company, and it’s fun. It’s like rooming with good friends: I might not spend every waking hour with them, but I see them most every day and I enjoy our time together.

But I have some visitors in my brain of late: Mickey and Cecily, my characters for the two versions of The Odd Couple. They’ll only be staying with us until mid to late February, which puts me on company behavior until they leave. They get first dibs on my time and attention. I try not to neglect my novel characters, but I feel the pressure of our limited time and I can’t ignore my visitors for long. And the two groups don’t play well together. I don’t want to banish my novel characters, even for a few weeks, but I only have so much creative attention to give–it runs out long before time does. When I’m feeling particularly torn between them, I find myself retreating all together, ducking out, hoping the characters will figure it out for me.

In an ideal world, I would have enough energy for everyone. I could spend the mornings in my novel and the afternoons in the plays. There would be no blank stares, no uncomfortable silences. But they’re both fighting for one portion of my brain, and I can’t seem to expand it. I can’t cannibalize the part that calculates my daily expenditures, or the part reserved for guitar practice, or even the section designated for reading. It’s as if my brain doesn’t want me to spend my whole life in fictional worlds, talking to and developing people who don’t technically exist. It demands that I create things with my hands, that I do math from time to time, that I look at the world in front of my eyes.

When I have company in the real world, I set my regular life aside so I can focus on them. I reconfigure my schedule to spend maximum time with my guests. I talk to them more than I talk to my husband, but I do still talk to him. What’s most often sacrificed during a visit is my alone time, but I often find a way to have some, whether it’s going to bed early or taking a solo trip to the grocery store. If I don’t take these breathers, I start to become a useless hostess–quiet, distracted, surly–and by the time the guest leave, I’m ready to collapse.

I keep feeling guilty when I take time away from my characters (lately, I’ve taken solace in the serene repetition of my crochet hook) but I’m starting to think it’s okay if it prevents total burnout. I can’t neglect my novel characters entirely, but I have to know when to rest. It was my tendency to push myself too hard that made my first “novel” stiff, dry, and unimaginative–at least in part. I just have to trust that my novel characters will be faithful, and that when Mickey and Cecily leave, they will be waiting.