How do you get ideas for your characters? Describe the process of creating them.

The short answer is that they just come to me. 

For the story I mentioned before that “haunts” me, that character came to me when sitting in my car at lunch, watching squirrels scamper by.  The original first line “I live my life in dreams” just popped into my head.  It was like whoa, who are you?  And she then just started feeding me tidbits of her story. 

 In terms of process, I don’t find myself having a story idea and then finding characters I need to create to fit.  It is more of the characters coming first and me then needing to work through the “what” and “why” of their actions.  Like, if there is a lady tied up in the backseat and the driver chatting with her about the landscape, I need to determine how did these folks meet and their story.