Character voicing and behaviour

I often think in accents or voices. Sometimes it's a result of a particular character in a movie or something which catches my attention, and I'll find my internal monologue will take that on, perhaps for hours. Oh, yeah, I entertain myself quite a lot. The other day it was sparked by an offhand comment in a FB post. I thought of a rejoinder, and it played in my mind in a slow western drawl, and Wilfred Brimley's voice. Then everything I thought was doing this for a while.
I used this when I was writing my novel Falling Up. Different characters have different voices and manner in my imagination, and I hope I was able to write them well enough for readers to get that, too.

An example of a character I had a lot of fun writing was Terence, the guy from the steel mill in Ohio.

This is from chapter 4, which is included in the free preview on Amazon, so I'm not giving anything away. First, some context.

People who put up fences usually didn't appreciate him just dropping in wherever, so he followed the fence to find a manned gate. It was fully dark when he found one. He landed on the road leading to it, then started walking toward the gatehouse. Two men came out, staring at him wide-eyed. Their reaction made him think about how he must look to them. He could have landed farther along the road and walked here, but his lights hovering overhead would probably still result in the same response. He was careful to have the lights in front of him slightly, shining back down on him so his face wasn’t in shadow, but this only served to cast him in an aura of light. But just walking up to them in darkness had its own dangers. Peter was starting to realize his lights were a mixed blessing, but he loved having them anyway.
With a sigh, Peter called out, “Are you open for business? I'd like to talk to someone about trading scrap for iron product.”
“Uh, no one is here for you to talk to. Can you go to the office in the morning?”
“That would be fine. Where is the office?”
“Right back down the road you got here on.”
“Ok, I'll follow the road back. What does the office look like?”
“It's the only building there, a half kilometer back.”
“Thanks very much, and have a great evening!” Then Peter lifted, turned, and followed the road.
It was several seconds after Peter's light faded from sight before the guards, still wide-eyed and avoiding eye contact with each other, turned without a word and returned to their gatehouse.

Peter returned to the office building the next morning right after breakfast. Since he was travelling east, he wasn't going to arrive just after they opened, so he travelled extra fast to get there as soon as he could. Thinking of the reaction from the guards last night, he left his lights high in the air and landed around the curve of the road from the building, then casually walked to it.
A man and a woman stopped talking when he opened the door, and they just stared at him, mouths open.
“Good morning! Is this the place for me to arrange to bring in scrap metal in trade for iron product?”
The man blinked, swallowed, and said, “Are you the boy with the lights?”
Peter, taken aback, answered, “Uh, yes, I am, but how did you know?”
“We were just discussing whether we were going to fire one of the night guards for sleeping on the job when he reported a boy who was glowing, and who then flew away, or whether we were going to put both guards on sick leave when the second guard finally admitted he'd seen the boy too. Then just now there was thunder in a clear sky, and not two minutes later you walk in the door!”
“Thunder?” Peter thought quickly. There was turbulence when he was flying so fast, but it wasn't a problem — or so he thought. Maybe he was pushing the air out of the way and making wind or something. He'd have to talk to Teacher about this!
“Well, sorry about that. I didn't intend to scare you. I'm just wanting to do some trading here.”
Urgently, the man asked, “What about the flying?”
After a second's hesitation, Peter lifted himself off the floor to hang there, unmoving.
Both could see he was floating, and the man came around the counter to Peter. Crouching down, he said, “May I?”
“Go ahead.”
He touched the floor beneath Peter's feet, then the bottom of Peter's shoes. “How do you do it?”
“I can control gravity with my mind.”
“Gravity? So you can remove gravity from where you are, to fly?”
“Hmm, close enough.”
Standing, the man looked around in the air above Peter's head. “And the lights?”
Smiling, Peter said, “My invention! Car alternators powering car headlights! Portable lights!”
“But where? Did you leave them at home today?”
“I did bring them. I take them everywhere, even during the day! I haven't had them long, and I'm still enjoying shining them all over. Uh, I left them hanging on the other side of that tree —”
“You hung them in that tree?”
“No, I hung them in the air.” With that, Peter lowered himself back to the floor.
“Could I see your lights? I love to build things too!”
Peter grinned, walked to the door, and opened it. It was a round knob, so it was difficult for him to turn it with gravity. A few seconds later, his lights streamed through the door in a line. Peter dissolved the bubbles around the lights so they could hear the alternators, then spun them up to turn on the lights. Encouraged by their lack of fear, he let go of the door, and closed it with a bit of gravity as he walked back to them. He was almost disappointed when they didn't seem to notice.
Excitedly, the man asked, “What makes the alternators spin?”
Peter and he answered almost in unison, “Gravity!”
“Do you have to push more gravity into them or something to keep them spinning?”
“Nope. I only stop the spin when I don't need the lights on because they will burn out after a while.”
“So, the gravity doesn't run out after a while?”
Peter thought he'd already answered this question. “No. I set the gravity inside to spin it, and then dissolve the gravity when I want the spin to stop. I've used these for hours at a time and there's no change.”
The man looked stunned. He just started pacing back and forth, muttering under his breath. Peter heard some words that were spoken slightly louder. “No change!” “Ever!” “Limitless!” “Revolution!”
After several minutes of this, he slumped into a chair, holding his head in his hands, still muttering.
Since the man appeared to be otherwise occupied, Peter walked the rest of the way to the counter, held out his hand to the woman. “Hi, I'm Richard Piles, but people call me Peter!”
Laughing at the joke, she shook his hand. “Alice Greasley! Pleased to meet you, Peter!” Nodding at the man, “That's my husband, Terence! He's extremely pleased to meet you too, and when he comes out of that coma, I'm sure he'll tell you so himself!”
Somewhat distractedly, Peter replied, “I look forward to it. Say, I'd like to apologize to those guards for the trouble I made for them.”
“No apology necessary! If anything, it's us who need to apologize to them for not believing them!”
“Yes, well, I don't expect you often get someone who can fly coming around.”
Alice laughed. “No, you're right! An extraordinary claim, for sure!”
“I hate to think of how they're feeling right now.”
Alice waved that off. “We sent them home without telling them anything about what we were considering to do with their report, so I expect they're both sawing logs right now. But if you want to make sure they're ok, they come back on shift at 5 PM.”
“I'd like that, but I don't want to just drop in on them in the dark again, that would be cruel.”
Alice smiled. “They will be checking in at the office just before 5, so you could just make sure you're back here by then.”
“Um, I don't have a watch.”
“You don't keep time, where you live?”
“Well, no, but it would be complicated for me with my travelling anyway.”
Terence suddenly joined the conversation. “Does it get dark earlier here than where you live?”
“Yes, it does.”
“So, you live some distance to the west from here! That explains why you were talking to the night guards!” Jumping out of his chair, he continued, “Of course! The sonic boom!”
“The what?”
“The thunder we heard just before you walked in. You were flying faster than the speed of sound! You broke the sound barrier!”
“I didn't know there was a barrier. Who calls it that?”
“The men who were building jet planes to go ever faster over a century ago. Do you ever experience turbulence while flying?”
“Sure, I feel turbulence on the outside of my bubble, but it's no problem.”
Slapping his arms against his sides, Terence said, “No problem? No problem? Men died figuring out how to build aircraft that could go faster than the speed of sound!”
It was Peter's turn to stand there with his mouth open. Airplanes that could fly as fast as he could? The thought that they might, and that it would be dangerous, simply hadn't occurred to him. Then a memory struck him. “Can flying faster than sound break the tops off trees?”
Laughing, Terence said, “Are you bragging? Or asking?” He held up his hand. “I get it.” After he had control of himself again, he said, “You are such a remarkable young man! What did you say your name was?” He walked toward Peter with his hand out. “I'm Terence, and I'm so thrilled to meet you!”
Peter shook the offered hand. “Call me Peter!” Seeing Terence squinting against the light now shining in his eyes, and that Terence had not paid any attention to them after he had first demonstrated them, Peter dissolved the fields inside the alternators. The alternators spun down, and the lights faded to dark. Peter moved them to above the door.
It was not lost on either Alice or Terence that Peter didn't even look at his lights when he sent them back over his head to hang in the air near the wall. Terence said, “Ah, yes! Spatial awareness!”
“So, can I trade scrap for processed iron product? How much can you take, and what ratio will you give me back?”
Alice answered, “Yes, we'd love to expand our market! I think we can handle any amount you care to bring us, and we'll give you one ton of steel for every ten tons of scrap, not counting the waste. Our shredder can handle anything up to the size of a car, though we have to flatten it first.”
“Cars! That's great! Are burnt-out cars ok? No one is going to use those for parts or try to get them running.”
“Even better! Most of the waste product is burnt away, so your return ratio will be better!”
“Can I start today? I remember seeing about a hundred cars on one highway, all crunched together, that burnt. I've seen lots of other burnt cars even in cites too! Flattening them is no problem either; they take up less space when I stack them for transport.”
Alice replied, “Of course! Drop your load off whenever you have enough to make it worth bringing in.”
“Then I'll go get that highway clump now. I should be back in a few hours.”
Alice and Terence gasped, looked at each other, and Alice said, “We're going to need more workers!”
Peter said, “Nice meeting you! See you soon, then!” Then he briskly walked to the door, held it open while his lights flew out in single file, then flew after them. Alice and Terence simply stood there at the abrupt departure of the most amazing person they'd ever met. They were still staring as the door gently closed, latching with a click, though Peter was already gone.