The Life and Times of Johnny Plotpoint

"No. That's the problem, Johnny. You're real, and you've been riding around on the same damn 1935 Indian since 1953." He turned his computer around and closed it. "I don't quite know how to explain this to you. You aren't my invention, and you, or some variation of you has been around for a lot longer than forty some odd years, it's just that somehow, in 1953, in a little gas station out west, you came to life."

Johnny looked at the cover of the magazine. August 1953. "That's when I met you."

"Yes. You told me to try writing. I did. I've been writing ever since. Three years later, I quit my job at the garage and started writing full-time. I retired - as much as somebody can retire from writing - ten years ago and I bought this place." Lane looked around at the coffee shop. "It was your comment that got me started. Since then I've been trying to track you down."

"How did you find me?"

"Well, that's a little hard to explain. The more I moved around the country and talked to people, the more people mentioned having seen someone like you who changed their life. The funny thing was, you never aged, and neither did the bike." He paused for a moment, looking down at the table in front of him. "But you always disappeared before they got to know you. Frankly, most of them wondered if it really happened."

"So what you're saying is that I don't exist." He looked down at the cover of the magazine, then up at the computer again. "Except in here." He tapped the computer. "Like Sam Hall." Johnny picked up his cigarette and lighter, then remembered that it was out of fluid.

"Go ahead, Johnny. Try it again."

Johnny flipped the lighter open and lit it in one smooth motion. He tossed the cigarette up at his mouth and missed. He looked up at Lane.

"Most real people can't do that, Johnny. You'll have to practice."

"Am I real?" He asked, lighting his cigarette and flipping the ash in an ashtray.

"I don't know, Johnny." Lane looked over at him. "I think you always were." He looked down at the covers of their magazines. "As real as Sam, anyway. Maybe more." He paused for a second, watching Johnny roll his cigarette around in the ashtray. "You've always been sort of a bit character - no one ever paid attention to you. If you look at it from the point of view of a writer, you were always the 'plotpoint' character - the one who shows up just in time to deliver a line that's crucial to the plot of the story, then he's never heard from again. It's like you've been living your life as that character - showing up when you needed to, doing what you needed to do, then disappearing. To you, time is continuous - you've just been riding around doing what you do."

"So my life is just a series of stories." He picked up the magazine again. "Or just one story, like the ones in this magazine. Am I just a freak in a science fiction story?" He looked back up at Lane.