Quotes & Sayings About Standing Back Up

She kissed me. She kissed me. What I mean is, I was standing there, lips puckered, brain puckered, and she just stepped up and threw her tongue into my mouth. For a moment, I thought maybe she'd tripped on a floorboard and stuck out her tongue as a reflex - but that didn't seem very likely somehow, and anyway, once she'd got her balance back, wouldn't she have put her tongue away again? No, she was definitely kissing me. — Hugh Laurie

Another time, he blew up his house in Bel Air. Someone was doing drugs there and they left the ether open. The fumes are like wavy cartoon lines; they find fire and then the fire follows the fumes back to the source and explodes. When it's going critical, you can hear it go up in a whistle. Sly was back in a corner of his house, in a bathroom, and the ether had drifted from the kitchen. When he lit the pipe, it blew up the part of the house he was in - it was an addition, and it separated from the rest of the structure. When the smoke cleared, the bathroom had fallen clean off. He was standing on the edge of the house as cars drove by. He was standing on a ledge about six inches wide, with the door heading into the kitchen right next to him. He slid back into the house, closed the door, and stayed like that for more than a year. — George Clinton

Memories had come back to Thomas on several occasions. The Changing, the dreams he'd had since, fleeting glimpses here and there, like quick lightning strikes in his mind. And right now, listening to the white-suited man talk, it felt as if he were standing on a cliff and all the answers were just about to float up from the depths for him to see in their entirety. The urge to grasp those answers was almost too strong to keep at bay.
But he was still wary. He knew he'd been a part of it all, had helped design the Maze, had taken over after the original Creators died and kept the program going with new recruits. "I remember enough to be ashamed of myself," he admitted. "But living through this kind of abuse is a lot different than planning it. It's just not right. — James Dashner

I'm sorry I started all this by trying to fly and I'd take it back if I could but I can't, so please think of it from my point of view: if you die I will have a dead brother and it will be me instead of you who suffers.
Justin thought of his brother on that warm summer day, standing up on the windowsill holding both their futures, light and changeable as air, in his outstretched arms.
Of course, Justin thought, I'm part of his fate just as he's part of mine. I hadn't considered it from his point of view. Or from the point of view of the universe, either. It's just a playing field crammed full of cause and effect, billions of dominoes, each knocking over billions more, setting off trillions of actions every second. A butterfly flaps its wings in Africa and my brother in Luton thinks he can fly.
The child nodded. A piano might fall on your head, he said, but it also might not. And in the meantime you never know. Something nice might happen. — Meg Rosoff

Hey, dragon!" Jay said loudly. The dragon opened one eye. "How can you tell if you have a dragon in your bathroom? The door won't close! How long was the dragons vacation? Four days and three knights! How about this one? Three ninja and a dragon walk into a dojo, and
"
The Lightning Dragon swiped it's massive tail, knocking Jay off his feet.
"That's the worst thing about dragons," muttered Jay, standing back up. "They don't know good jokes when they hear them. — Greg Farshtey

He urged his horse forward, his body straining, ready to be on his way. But at the last second he looked back at her and swerved, drawing the beast up beside her. From underneath the brim of his hat, he peered down at her. The intensity in the blue depths dragged her in until she felt as if she were drowning. "You've done good so far, Priscilla." At the unexpected words of praise, she sucked in a breath. His gaze dropped to her lips, lingered there for an instant before returning to her eyes, darker, bluer. Her lungs stopped working, and she clutched a hand to her chest. "I'll see your pretty face in a couple days." She nodded, too breathless to respond. He kicked his heels into his horse and left her standing, watching after him, wondering if he was taking her heart with him. — Jody Hedlund

Hey," he says.
I feel foolish for being out of breath and standing over him. The moonlight cuts a line down my chest. "Hey," I say.
"Checking on me?"
"I couldn't sleep. Scottie. She's in the bathroom." I stop talking.
"Yeah?" he says and sits up.
"She's playacting." I don't know how to say it. I don't need to say it. "She's kissing the mirror."
"Oh," he says. "I used to do some messed-up things as a kid. Still do."
I feel wide awake, which always makes me angry in the middle of the night. I'm useless without sleep. I can't get myself to go back to my own room. I sit on the end of the bed by his feet. "I'm worried about my daughters," I say. "I'm worried there's something wrong with them."
Sid rubs his eyes.
"Forget it," I say. "Sorry for waking you up."
"It's going to get worse," he says. "After your wife dies." He holds the blanket up to his chin. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Once you wrong a woman, beware. They'll skin you alive. Might cry over your pain, nurse you back to health after, but they'll take you to the cleaners as sure as I'm standing here. You should have begged for forgiveness for being born before you showed up unannounced. — K.F. Breene

I might not say it, but I obviously show you how I feel," she says. "Why do the words have to be so important?"

"They just are," he says, standing up and brushing off the back of his jeans. "Not because you're saying them, but because you're not. — Jennifer E. Smith

Exactly. The dots guy. I've always thought getting older was a bit like looking at those paintings. You're born, and that's when you're standing right up next to the canvas. Nothing makes any sense. There's just a lot of light and color. But as you get older, you begin to back away, and that's when the image starts to cohere. All those little spots of color turn into flowers, or people, or dogs. You gain perspective. — Tommy Wallach

I fell so many times and got back up. I been through the toughest times with my family, but I'm still standing. — Kevin Durant

Another time, I was at the bar getting a drink and this geezer is stood at the bar with a ciggie in his mouth, trying his best to look rock hard. He takes a drag and points his finger in my face and drawls, 'Don't I know you?'
He was looking snake-eyed at me like a typical big screen gangster.
I stood in front of him and drawled back, 'I don't know, but they call me Richy Horsley,' and then bang, I batter him with a left hook that landed with a strange dull thud. Mr Movie Gangster was stood there leaning against the bar and staring out in to space, knocked out standing up. — Stephen Richards

But back then, back on Lispenard Street, I didn't know so much of this. Then, we were only standing and looking up at that red-brick building, and I was pretending that I never had to fear for him, and he was letting me pretend this: that all the dangerous things he could have done, all the ways he could have broken my heart, were in the past, the stuff of stories, that the time that lay behind us was scary, but the time that lay ahead of us was not. — Hanya Yanagihara

Opening the door, he nearly did a double take into the mirror behind
him.
Hooch. Hooch, pushing his shades back up onto his head, and re-shouldering the bergan. Hooch, standing in the doorway.
"Been thinking."
Two words, more than usual.
"Been around a bit."
Six, speech worthy of a national holiday.
"Looking for a station now."
Eleven, whole fucking fireworks.
"Central station."
Thirteen, and the heavens came down for Matt.
"You still offering?"
Sixteen, and the world stopped spinning.
Matt stood thinking for a while, not a muscle in his face twitched. Then
stepped aside, gestured the other man to follow him. Closed the door.
"One condition."
Hooch's brows rose for a split second.
Matt broke into a grin at last, which threatened to split his face. "Promise
not to talk too much. — Marquesate

around to look again. There was a tabby cat standing on the corner of Privet Drive, but there wasn't a map in sight. What could he have been thinking of? It must have been a trick of the light. Mr. Dursley blinked and stared at the cat. It stared back. As Mr. Dursley drove around the corner and up the road, he watched the cat in his mirror. — J.K. Rowling

Halloo down there," the voice said. Ziba saw a burly soldier in armor standing at the edge of the cliff. "Are you Israelites?"
"We are," Jonathan said.
"We thought all of the Israelites were still hiding in the caves." Ziba heard others laughing and could tell that they had been drinking. "We have plenty of wine here if you want to come join us. We even have some of your countrymen who are now in our army."
"If we come up there, it will be only to fight and kill you," Jonathan said.
The Philistine laughed. "Well, then, come on up. It's plenty boring up here. Maybe you can liven things up, small as you are."
Jonathan looked at Ziba, who then nodded.
"We'll be right up," Jonathan shouted back. — Glen Robinson

You go to a show, and there's no food at all, so if you're doing shows back to back, you can forget eating. I remember standing up in the bath one day, and there was a mirror in front of me, and I was so thin! I hated it. I never liked being that skinny. — Kate Moss

I come alive by giving back, seeing my children smile and hearing them laugh, standing up for things I believe in, achieving a goal, being there for those who need me, spending quality time with my husband, and indulging in "me moments," whether it's a vacation or just a night out with friends. — Trista Sutter

As American culture changes, the scandal of Christianity is increasingly right up front, exactly where it was in the first century. The shaking of American culture will get us back to the question Jesus asked his disciples at Caesarea Philippi: "Who do you say that I am?" As the Bible Belt recedes, those left standing up for Jesus will be those who, like Simon Peter of old, know how to answer that question. Once Christianity is no longer seen as part and parcel of patriotism, the church must offer more than "What would Jesus do?" moralism and the "I vote values" populism to which we've grown accustomed. Good. — Russell D. Moore

At that, Ascher stood up. "Hi," she said, smiling brightly. "You don't know me. I'm Hannah. Back off my partner before you get hurt." "I know who you are, hot stuff," I drawled, not standing. I set my staff down across the table. "And I already backed off your partner. You can tell from how there aren't any splatter marks. Play nice, Ascher." Her smile vanished at my response, and her dark eyes narrowed. She drummed her nails on the tabletop exactly once, slowly, as if contemplating a decision. A smirk touched her mouth. "So you're the infamous Dresden." Her eyes went past me, to Karrin. Ascher was a foot taller than she was. "And this is your bodyguard? Seriously? Aren't they supposed to be a little bigger?" "She represents the Lollipop Guild," I replied. "She'll represent them right through the front and out the back of your skull if you don't show a little respect. — Jim Butcher

Katie let the curtain fall back into place. Standing before the window, she felt herself let go of the old world and embrace the new. She would survive this. She would go on. That was all there was to it. She wouldn't give up without a fight. She would do whatever it took to survive. — Rhiannon Frater

She came quickly over to me and held out her hand. I looked at her full of distrust. Was she doing this freely, with a light heart? Or was she doing it just to get rid of me? She put her arm around my neck, tears in her eyes. I just stood and looked at her. She offered me her mouth but I couldn't believe her, it was bound to be a sacrifice on her part, a means of getting it over with.
She said something, it sounded to me like "I love you anyway!" She said it very softly and indistinctly, I may not have heard it correctly, perhaps she didn't say exactly those words. But she threw herself passionately on my neck, held both arms around my neck a little while, even raised herself on tiptoe to reach well up, and stood thus.
Afraid that she was forcing herself to show me this tenderness, I merely said "How beautiful you are now!"
That was all I said. I stepped back, bumped against the door and walked out backward. She was left standing inside. — Knut Hamsun

There were some times-when things got bad-that I saw something flash across Rogerson's face, like he couldn't believe what he'd done. Like he'd just woken up and found himself standing over me, fist still clenched, looking down in disbelief at the place on my shoulder/arm/stomach/back/leg where he'd just hit me. I wondered if he was thinking of his father, and the marks he'd left behind. And even as I felt the spot with my own fingers, knowing already what the bruise would look like, I felt sorry for him, like for that one second he was just as scared as I was. It was so strange. Sorry for him. — Sarah Dessen

He always knew what I would have liked to say, and with startling and increasing accuracy as we spent more time together. One time, for example, I was wondering exactly how he had lost that tooth at the back of his mouth when he saw my eyes on his waning grin and replied, "Ran into a fence when I was twelve." And then I wondered how the heck he could have missed the giant fence standing right in front of him and he said, "Shut up. — Rose Christo

Will looked back at me, startled, and I kept my heart muscle strong, feeling something inside me shiver like a pale green flower shoot just waking up for spring. But whatever that thing was, it was still too new to feel ready to bloom; it wanted time to set down roots. Someday soon I was going to bloom like crazy and then I'd have what I needed to keep me standing tall. — Ingrid Law

Only Merlin and her guards ever woke her in the mornings, and her guards only shouted to her through the doors.
Britt picked her head off her pillow. "Merlin?"
Merlin, once again standing out in the hallway, hissed through the door."You're still in bed."
"Yeah, so?"
"It is indecent for you to allow a man into your bedchambers when you are still in bed!"
Britt rolled her eyes and sat up. "What did you want?"
"Get up. We're going to mass."
"No, we're not. You might be, but I'm not."
"Oh yes you are, you little heathen."
"It's boring. The pastor only talks in Greek or Hebrew or whatever that language is."
"He's the archbishop, and he conducts the service in Latin."
"Mmm, yeah that," Britt said, falling back into her bed with a thump.
"Do not lie back down you unschooled foundling!"
"Too late," Britt said. "If you want me to go to mass you're going to have to drag me out of here. How indecent would that be? — K.M. Shea

I still like boiled potatoes with the skins on," he said, "and I do not want a man standing in back of my chair, laughing up his sleeve at me while I am taking the potatoes' jackets off." Of pleasure and material things he was wary. "I have never known what to do with money after my expenses were paid. I can't squander it on myself without hurting myself," he said, "and nobody wants to do that. — David Halberstam

How everyone is struggling for something. Trying to keep the balance.

Struggling to find their way back. Doing the best they can with what they've been dealt. Staying in place, doing anything to keep from sinking. To keep from rising.

Until something changes. Like a day at school, a friend for lunch, someone standing up for you.

And the choice to feel. Standing before you.

Realizing what part is yours. What you can and can't do. Who you are. Who you are meant to be.

More than the sum of all your broken parts. — Ash Parsons

At one stopover on the train journey home, Hans told his sister Inge later, he saw a young girl with the Star of David on her breast; she was repairing tracks on the line, along with other people with yellow badges on their clothes. Her face was pallid, sunken in; her eyes, beyond grief and terror. Impulsively, Hans thrust his rations in her hand. She looked up at him, then at his uniform. She threw the packet of food to the ground.
He scooped it up, wiped off the dust, and picked a daisy growing by the side of the tracks. He placed the package, with the daisy on top, at her feet. He said, "I would have liked to give you a little pleasure." He boarded the train.
When he looked back, the girl was standing there, watching the train disappear, the flower in her hair. — Jud Newborn

Today is one of the days when Ma is Gone.
She won't wake up properly. She's here but not really. She stays in Bed with the pillows on her head.
Silly Penis is standing up, I squish him down.
I eat my hundred cereal and I stand on my chair to wash the bowl and Meltedy Spoon. It's very quiet when I switch off the water. I wonder did Old Nick come in the night. I don't think he did because the trash bag is still by Door, but maybe he did only he didn't take the trash? Maybe Ma's not just Gone. Maybe he squished her neck even harder and now she's -
I go up really close and listen till I hear breath. I'm just one inch away, my hair touches Ma's nose and she puts her hand up over her face so I step back.
I don't have a bath on my own, I just get dressed.
There's hours and hours, hundreds of them.
Ma gets up to pee but not talking, with her face all blank. I already put a glass of water beside Bed but she just gets back under Duvet. — Emma Donoghue

He who is silent is forgotten; he who does not advance falls back; he who stops is overwhelmed; out distanced, crushed; he who ceases to grow becomes smaller; he who leaves off, gives up; the condition of standing still is the beginning of the end. — Henri Frederic Amiel

Inside your head you hear
a phone ringing, and when you open your eyes you're washing up
in a stranger's bathroom,
standing by the window in a yellow towel, only twenty minutes away
from the dirtiest thing you know.
All the rooms of the castle except this one, says someone, and suddenly
darkness,
suddenly only darkness.
In the living room, in the broken yard,
in the back of the car as the lights go by. In the airport
bathroom's gurgle and flush, bathed in a pharmacy of
unnatural light,
my hands looking weird, my face weird, my feet too far away. — Richard Siken

One day I was standing with my stage manager, Sandy Prudden, and Buddy Sheffield watching as Kermit the Frog (with the help of the late Jim Henson) sweetly sang a song. Sandy was always a big joker. He sidled up to me and said, "Isn't it amazing the way Kermit can sing like that with somebody's hand up his ass." Without missing a beat, I came back with, "Shoot, that ain't nothin'. I did that for seven years on the 'The Porter Wagoner Show. — Dolly Parton

You might think you're the villain in my story, Lux, but what you don't seem to realize is that I don't care. Princess or Evil Queen, I want you standing by my side when the tale comes to an end. So I'm not walking away - I'm going to wear you down, until you're ready - no, until you're dying - to tell me what happened back then." Another kiss landed on my lips, and I fought off a tremble of desire. "And Freckles?"
My eyes flickered up to meet his searing gaze.
"It's going to be a hell of a lot of fun. — Julie Johnson

There is no stillness, only change. Yesterday's here is not today's here. Yesterday's here is somewhere in Russia, in a wilderness in Canada, a deep blue nowhere out in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. It's behind the sun, it's in deep space, hundreds of thousands, millions of miles left behind. We can never wake up in the same place we went to sleep in. Our place in the universe, the universe itself, it all changes faster and faster by the second. Every one of us standing on this planet, we're all moving forwards and we're never ever coming back. The truth is, stillness is an idea, a dream. It's the thought of the friendly, welcoming lights still shining in all the places we've been forced to abandon. — Steven Hall

Are you going to the bonfire tonight?" he asked, shoving his papers in his bag. He had no organization at all. "No." He glanced up in surprise. "No?" Then he smiled. "Is fun not your thing?" I stuck out my tongue. "I didn't realize a fire in the middle of a field was considered fun." He was already standing, towering over me, but once I spoke, he dropped back into his chair and rotated so his body faced me. "It's not necessarily what you're doing. It's who you're doing it with."
-Romeo & Rimmel — Cambria Hebert

My heart sped up at the change in him. It was rare that I saw the hard-faced version of Preston standing in front on me. I was used to funny, pain-in-the-ass Preston. Easy-going Preston. The Preston who cuddled me when I needed it and held my hair back when I was throwing up, but before me was I'm-not-taking-this-shit Preston. Oh fuck!" ~ Ella, A Perfect Moment — Becca Lee

Five Rules for Leaving a Room in Anger": One: Do not pick up your books or papers. Leave them there. They will serve as a perfect reminder that you are gone. Two: Do no shove your chair back for the table while you are still sitting in it. Push it back as you are standing up. Three: Do not try to put your jacket on as you leave. Don't even fling it over your shoulder. You'll never be Jack Kennedy. Leave it on the chair back. Four: Do not announce that you are departing. Say nothing. Just go. Five: Never...ever look back. — Charles Rosenberg

Finally, I found what seemed at the time to be a lid of some sort. Presuming it was a toilet seat (but not really caring one way or the other) I lifted it up, then dropped my shorts and began to piss. Ahhh ... success. Then I stumbled back to bed and passed out. It wasn't until the next morning that I realized what had actually happened. I woke to the sight of Junior standing over my bed with a look of disgust on his face. Hey, man. Did you pee in my suitcase? — Dave Mustaine

The man they'd come to see was up and standing at the window with his back to them, so that only Sophia saw his squared stance and his shoulders and the brown hair fastened back above the collar of his shirt. He wore no coat, just breeks and boots, and in the fine white shirt he stood there pale and like a ghost, the only thing of light in that dull room.
He spoke again, not looking round, his voice grown hoarser from the illness. 'Did you ye see her? Was she well?'
'She will be now,' the colnel gently said ...
Sophia could not move from where she stood. Could not believe it.
Then he turned, a ghost no longer, but a breathing man. A living man, whose shadowed eyes grew brighter in the grip of hard emotion as he left the window and in two strides crossed to fold her in his arms ... — Susanna Kearsley

I jerked my hand back and looked up, horrified. "The ground feels like skin!"
A slow smile crept onto Hades' face. "Zeus got bored with the whole rock and eagle bit."
Rock and eagle bit ... ? Then it hit me. "Prometheus?"
"You're standing on him," Hades remarked.
My stomach turned. "Oh gods, I think I'm going to vomit."
"Perfect," the god said. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

And you just now say something?" Tink vaulted over the couch. Like, jumped up and cleared the back and landed, standing on the center cushion.

I gaped at him. "How in the world did your towel stay on for that when I can't even get one to stay wrapped around me when I get out of the shower?"

"Magic," he replied. "Seriously. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

The first time I met Crenshaw was about three years ago, right after first grade ended. It was early evening, and my family and I had parked at a rest stop off a highway. I was lying on the grass near a picnic table, gazing up at the stars blinking to life. I heard a noise, a wheels-on-gravel skateboard sound. I sat up on my elbows. Sure enough, a skater on a board was threading his way through the parking lot. I could see right away that he was an unusual guy. He was a black and white kitten. A big one, taller than me. His eyes were the sparkly color of morning grass. He was wearing a black and orange San Francisco Giants baseball cap. He hopped off his board and headed my way. He was standing on two legs just like a human. "Meow," he said. "Meow," I said back, because it seemed polite. — Katherine Applegate

He pulled one of his brands out of the fire and stepped toward me, raising it. The sharp smell of red-hot metal made me sneeze--and when I looked up, the man's mouth was open with surprise.
My gaze dropped to the knife embedded squarely in his chest, which seemed to have sprouted there. But knives don't sprout, even in dungeons, I thought hazily, as the torturer fell heavily at my feet. I turned my head, half rising from the chair--
And saw the Marquis of Shevraeth standing framed in the doorway. At his back were four of his liveried equerries, with swords drawn and ready.
The Marquis strolled forward, indicated the knife with a neatly gloved hand, and gave me a faint smile. "I trust the timing was more or less advantageous?"
"More or less," I managed to say before the rushing in my ears washed over me, and I passed out cold right on top of the late torturer. — Sherwood Smith

Shannon fought her laughter down and tiptoed back to the bedroom to retrieve her cell phone. Big, badass, John Palmer was sleeping with a lonely puppy. Padding back out to the living room she snapped a quick picture. "If that goes anywhere other than your phone, there will be hell to pay," he growled, sending her into fits of giggles. The puppy's eyes snapped open and she lifted her head wobbily. When she saw Shannon standing a few feet away, she tumbled to the floor and jogged over to pee at her feet. John laughed out loud as he sat up on the couch. "That's what you get for trying to be sneaky. You can get this one." Shannon — J.M. Madden

The truth," Mrs. Hodgkins says, standing back up and turning to her cold marble pupils, "is imagination without boundaries is like a gun, it can be dangerous and kill." She turns slightly and points to the back of her head to demonstrate. Her brains spill over the left crevice of her skull, clinging like hardened jelly. "Or imagination can save lives. — Mav Skye

The Master Speed No speed of wind or water rushing by but you have speed far greater. You can climb back up a stream of radiance to the sky, and back through history up the stream of time. And you were given this swiftness, not for haste nor chiefly that you may go where you will, but in the rush of everything to waste, that you may have the power of standing still
off any still or moving thing you say. Two such as you with such a master speed From one another once you are agreed that life is only life forevermore together wing to wing and oar to oar. — Robert Frost

Sometimes a cloudless swatch of sky would blow past the moon, and Pella could see the outline of Mike's face in a slightly sharper relief. It was strange the way he loved her: a sidelong and almost casual love, as if loving her were simply a matter of course, too natural to mention. Like their first meeting on the steps of the gym, when he'd hardly so much as glanced at her. With David and every guy before David, what passed for love had always been eye to eye, nose to nose; she felt watched, observed, like the prize at the zoo, and she wound up pacing, preening, watching back, to fit the part. Whereas Mike was always beside her. She would stand at the kitchen window and look out at the quad, at the Melville statue and beyond that the beach and the rolling lake, and realize that Make, for however long, had been standing beside her, staring at the same thing. — Chad Harbach

On harsh, frigid January days, when the winds are relentless and the snow piles up around us, I often think of our small feathered friends back on the Third Line. I wonder if the old feeder is still standing in the orchard and if anyone thinks to put out a few crumbs and some bacon drippings for our beautiful, hungry, winter birds. In the stark, white landscape they provided a welcome splash of colour and their songs gave us hope through the long, silent winter. — Arlene Stafford-Wilson

I woke myself in the darkness, and I knew only that a dream had scared me so badly that I had to wake up or die, and yet, try as I might, I could not remember what I had dreamed. The dream was haunting me: standing behind me, present and yet invisible, like the back of my head, simultaneously there and not there. — Neil Gaiman

The fan was spinning and as the shadows passed over the white ceiling I let my eyes unfocus until all of it looked like a universe being born or a planet unraveling, some creation or catastrophe depending on which way gravity was going and where you were standing. So instead of Elizabeth Taylor I thought about stars and how little I knew about them, and how if I was an explorer and I had to sail a boat across the ocean without rador or an electronic compass I'd be screwed because the only constellations I knew were the Big Dipper and Little Dipper and I always got them confused. And even though I knew I'd never have to sail that boat I still wished I knew more about stars and other things. And I wished I could remember lying in the back yard as a kid with my hands locked behind my head, looking up at the night sky and dreaming. But I couldn't, because it wasn't something I ever did. It would have been a nice memory though — Paul Neilan

Watch your back, wolf. There's a pall over this place and the bears are racking up enemies faster than Wal-Mart rakes in sales. When the time comes, it's going to get bloody. (Thorn)
I wouldn't have it any other way. (Fang)
Don't be so arrogant. Long before I was the debonair sophisticate standing in front of you, I was a warlord. I put more blood on my blade than Madame la Guillotine. The one thing all that battle taught me is that no one walks away without scars. No one. (Thorn) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

The witch's words were cut off and Izzy stumbled back into the earth.
Izzy looked up at the dragoness standing over her. her grandmother smiled. "What did I miss? I sensed I was missing something!"
Rhiannon looked down at her claws, "Did I step in something? I feel like I stepped in something. — G.A. Aiken

Being liked by the boys and girls on the bus doesn't necessarily earn you the respect of the people back home. Standing up to them, giving as good as you get, all that helps. — Susan Estrich

It was almost painful to watch,that kite of mine.
Tethered to the string in my hand. Dancing in the sky all alone.
My breath caught in my throat, my pulse beating wild and crazy on my chest. My heart soaring with every dip and turn of the kite,as if I were flying along,instead of standing with my two feet on the ground, squinting against the sun to see the dance.
What if it fell?
What if the breeze took it away?
I counted the seconds until I could reel it back in.
I was that kite.
Fragile against the wind. Soaring one minute. Spiraling straight down next. Just looking for something to hold me up.
Before I spun out of control and flew away.
Dissappearing fron sight. — Jenny B. Jones

I've been standing here plotting how to keep you naked twenty-four hours a day."
"Might be kinda hard to go back down to the party. Or the supermarket. Or church."
That made him chuckle. "Oh, it'll be hard alright. In fact ... " he pulled me against his hips again, "I'd say it already is."
"Wow, that was bad."
"I'll show you bad."
"Stop talking, you retard! Just take off your damned pants already."
"I'll show you retard."
"Oh my God."
His hands went to the belt at his waist, and then he slid his zipper down. Slowly. The move would have been sexy as hell if he hadn't thrown out this line along with it: "Want me to dance for you?"
"Oh my God! Just shut up! — T. Torrest

I'm not into those kind of rivalries. I remember standing out in front of Stratford, minding my own business. Carload of about eighty kids would pull up: 'STRATFORD SUCKS!' Am I supposed to run after these guys? I'd just stand there, you know. They'd back up. 'STRATFORD SUCKS! ... STRATFORD SUCKS!' I'd say, 'I know. I go there. You're wasting gas, man. — Bill Hicks

Door's open!" she shouted. She was in her underwear, lying on the floor, arms outstretched and legs up against the couch. She tilted her head back and looked at me upside down. "Charlie, darling! Why are you standing on your head? — Daniel Keyes

When I hung up, Gabriel said, "Now you're going out that - "
"I'm not leaving you."
"Don't be stupid. I have a gun." He reached into his pocket and pulled out the .45.
"Which will knock you on your ass if you try firing with a bad leg. Sit down before you fall."
"I'm - "
"Sit down."
I walked to the door and peered out. If I strained, I could hear footsteps above. Anderson would
search the other rooms first. Then he'd come down here.
When I returned, Gabriel was still standing, leaning against the washing machine. Stubborn bastard.
"So you're staying with me?" he said.
"Yep."
"You may not want to do that."
"Too bad."
"I wouldn't stay for you."
"Probably not."
His mouth opened, as if he'd been prepared for me to disagree. He paused and then said, "I wouldn't. You know I wouldn't."
"Doesn't matter. You're my partner. I watch your back. — Kelley Armstrong

Edward still had the rifle up, sighted on Titus. Aikensen seemed frozen, standing there with the bloody knife. "Put it down, blondie, right now, or she's dead." "Edward." "Anita," he said. His voice sounded like it always did. We both knew he could drop Titus, but if the man's finger twitched while he died, I died, too. Choices. "Do it," I said. He pulled the trigger. Titus jerked back against the bars. Blood splattered over my face. A glob of something thicker than blood slid down my cheek. I breathed in shallow gasps. Titus slumped along the bars, gun still gripped in his hands. — Laurell K. Hamilton

I asked myself what I believed. I had never prayed a lot. I hoped hard, wished hard, but I didn't pray. I had developed a certain distrust of organised religion growing up, but I felt I had the capacity to be a spiritual person, and to hold some fervent beliefs. Quite simply, I believed I had a responsibility to be a good person, and that meant fair, honest, hardworking and honorable. If I did that, if I was good to my family, true to my friends, if I gave back to my community or to some cause, if I wasn't a liar, a cheat, or a thief, then I believed that should be enough. At the end of the day, if there was indeed some Body or presence standing there to judge me, I hoped I would be judged on whether I had lived a true life, not on whether I believed in a certain book, or whether I'd been baptised. — Lance Armstrong

She had just pulled her dress coat from it's hanger when Connor came bouncing out of her bedroom and down the hallway with something in his hand.
"Mommy, what's this jiggle stick?"
She looked up to see her son standing not two feet away from Reece with her purple jelly vibrator in his hand. And he was shaking it, making it waggle back and forth. — Pamela Clare

She was beautiful, standing there in her petticoat and shawl. She fetched a cup for him and waited while he drank, her poise keeping time at her neck, her feet bare on the earth floor. He imagined her taking him inside the cottage, lying on the bed. Giving her pleasure in the darkness. Spilling things he had seen into her ear. How the beauty of life and the world struck him like a fever sometimes, but how it was all mixed up and mangled with the hate. But he said and did none of those things, only, when he had drunk down the milk, handed the cup back, thanked her, and walked on. — Anna Hope

That was the only time, as I stood there, looking at that strange rubbish, feeling the wind coming across those empty fields, that I started to imagine just a little fantasy thing, because this was Norfolk after all, and it was only a couple of weeks since I'd lost him. I was thinking about the rubbish, the flapping plastic in the branches, the shore-line of odd stuff caught along the fencing, and I half-closed my eyes and imagined this was the spot where everything I'd ever lost since my childhood had washed up, and I was now standing here in front of it, and if I waited long enough, a tiny figure would appear on the horizon across the field, and gradually get larger until I'd see it was Tommy, and he'd wave, maybe even call. The fantasy never got beyond that
I didn't let it
and though the tears rolled down my face, I wasn't sobbing or out of control. I just waited a bit, then turned back to the car, to drive off to wherever it was I was supposed to be. — Kazuo Ishiguro

Think back for a moment on your own history
not just where you were born or where you grew up, but the circumstances that contributed to your being right here, right now. What were the moments along the way that wounded or scared you? Chances are, you've had a few. But here's what's remarkable: You are still here, still standing. — Oprah Winfrey

All bags are pack ready to go
i am standing here outside your door
i hate to wake you up to say goodbye
dawn is braking its early morn
the taxi waiting he blowing his horn
already i am so lonesome i could die
so kiss me and smile for me tell me that you'll wait for me and hold me like you never let me go
cause leaving on a jet plane don't know when ill be back again oh babe i hate to go
there so many let you down so many time i played around i tell you know that don't mean a thing every plase i go i'll think of you every song i sing i'll sing for you. — John Denver

No." Laurence said, "I mean to retire when we have returned. I have enough money to keep Temeraire now, and enough of a countenance to ask my brother to put us up on one of the farms."

Or they might return to Australia, or to China. Temeraire has every right to ask that of him now that the war was won. Laurence did not mean to refuse him, he only hoped to go back to Wollaton Hall first and find a way to carry it with him somehow. He longed in a deep inward part for Britain, for home, and the house standing at twilight with all the windows lit. A child's memory of peace. He would even be grateful there for the counterfeit honors that had been heaped onto his head, if they gave his mother some peace, and his brother need not be ashamed to give him a field for Temeraire to sleep in, for a little while. — Naomi Novik

It was one of the rare mornings when Dad was around. He'd gotten up early to go cycling, and he was sweaty, standing at the counter in his goony fluorescent racing pants, drinking green juice of his own making. His shirt was off, and he had a black heart-rate monitor strapped across his chest, plus some shoulder brace he invented, which is supposedly good for his back because it pulls his shoulders into alignment when he's at the computer. "Good morning to you, too," he said disapprovingly. I must have made some kind of face. But I'm sorry, it's weird to come down and — Maria Semple

THE TWINS WERE eighteen months old now, walking (and standing and staring and screaming and sitting) just like other children more or less their age, and Andy found herself increasingly preoccupied with those baby scrapbooks her brother's wife had sent when they were born. Andy had gotten Janny's to the six-month mark - the last photo was of her sitting up in the baby bath with her fingers in her mouth. Richie's and Michael's - not even birth pictures. Birth pictures of the twins existed, but they reminded Andy more of mug shots than of baby photos, naked in incubators, little skinny limbs and odd heads, no hair except where it shouldn't be, on arms and back, like monkeys. She had stuffed the scrapbooks onto the upper shelf in the closet in Richie and Michael's room, and every time she slid open that door, she would see their spines, white, pink, and blue, the silliest objects in her very modern house, ready to get thrown out. — Jane Smiley

What you can't do is leave me!"
He was thrown back. There were still six crewmen standing against him. That wasn't deterring him in the least, however, which only infuriated her the more. The fool man was going to get tossed in the river yet.
She might do it herself. She was, after all, fed up with being told what she could or couldn't do. "And why can't I leave you?"
"Because I love you!"
He hadn't even paused in throwing another punch to shout that. Georgina, however, went very still, and breathless, and nearly sat down on the deck, her knees had gone so weak with the incredible emotion that welled up inside her. — Johanna Lindsey

You could knock," Trey said. Brian paused in the bedroom's doorway holding his towel around his waist. Standing before the long dresser, Trey wrapped his arms around the thin young man in front of him and plastered his body to the guy's back. Trey's hand slid up under the hem of his new friend's T-shirt. The guy's eyes widened and he caught Trey's hands in his. "H-hey, Master Sinclair, erm, Brian. Can I call you Brian?" Brian shrugged and the guy flushed. "This isn't what it looks like. I don't like guys or anything." He shook his head vigorously. "You will," Trey murmured, inching the guy's shirt further up his belly. "Trey, are you molesting virgins again?" Brian grinned at his best friend's delight with his latest conquest. — Olivia Cunning

I wanted to tell her that the pleasure for me wasn't planning or doing or leaving; the pleasure was seeing our strings cross and separate and then come back together - but that seemed to cheesy to say, and anyway, she was standing up. — John Green

I stopped right in the middle of the road. There was no traffic. Before heading back towards my flat to get the number I paused for a while, I don't know how long, and stood in what had been the marksmen's sightlines. I turned the palms of my hands outwards, closed my eyes and thought about that memory of just before the accident, being buffeted by wind. Remembering it sent a tingling from the top of my legs to my shoulders and right up into my neck. It lasted for just a moment-but while it did it felt not-neutral. I felt different, intense: both intense and serene at the same time. I remember feeling this way very well: standing there, passive, with my palms turned outwards, feeling intense and serene. — Tom McCarthy

You'll have to pardon me," the magus said. "But with your country at war I can't see how any of it really matters."
Standing up, Eugenides pulled the papers from the magus's hands. "It matters, because I can't do anything, anymore, for this country, and it matters," he yelled as he threw the papers back to his desk, "because I only have one hand and it isn't even the right one!" Turning, he picked an inkpot off the desk and threw it to shatter on the door of his wardrobe, spraying black ink across the pale wood and onto the wall. Black drops like rain stained the sheets of his bed.
...
Eddis sighed. "Will you sit down and stop shouting?" she asked.
"I'll stop shouting. I won't sit down. I might need to throw more inkpots. — Megan Whalen Turner

In books there's always somebody standing by ready to say hey, the world's in danger, evil's on the rise, but if you're really quick and take this ring and put it in that volcano over there everything will be fine.
But in real life that guy never turns up. He's never there. He's busy handing out advice in the next universe over. In our world no one ever knows what to do, and everyone's just as clueless and full of crap as everyone else, and you have to figure it all out by yourself. And even after you've figured it out and done it, you'll never know whether you were right or wrong. You'll never know if you put the ring in the right volcano, or if things might have gone better if you hadn't. There's no answers in the back of the book. — Lev Grossman

The culture doesn't encourage you to think about such things until you're about to die. We're so wrapped up with egostical things, career, family, having enough money, meeting the mortgage, getting a new car, fixing the radiator when it breaks. We're involved in trillions of little acts just to keep going . So we don't get into the habit of standing back and looking at our lives and saying, Is this all? Is this all I want? Is something missing? — Morrie Schwartz.

My father is standing at the sink wearing a too-tight long-sleeved red T-Shirt, a pair of too-high jeans and sporting the type of orange glow that belongs only on Chernobyl victims. Plus his hair looks like an oil spill.
'Hey you,' he says, washing what looks to be some carrots under the sink. Are they carrots or are they parsnips reflecting the sheen of my father's tangerine skin? Hard to tell.
'You've fake tanned yourself again,' I say - it's a statement, not a question. 'Too much?' he says, innocently. 'I just didn't want to be one of those pasty office workers and I thought it wouldn't hurt to back up last week's application with another hit.'
'Dad, you look-'
'Sun kissed?'
'Radioactive. And what the hell happened to your hands?'
- Cat — Rebecca Sparrow

I have a surprise for you," the Beast had said, in his usual brusque tone.
Belle had just come in from feeding her horse, Philippe, and was standing by the kitchen's back door, shaking snow from her cloak. She'd taken one look at him - at the scowl on his face, at his clenched paws, at his awkward stance - and said, "No, thank you."
The Beast had blinked, taken aback by her refusal. His scowl had deepened. "I said, I have a surprise for you!"
"And I heard you," Belle had replied, "but I've had enough surprises to last me a lifetime. Including cold, dark cells, packs of wolves, and tantrums."
"Tantrums? Tantrums?" the Beast had sputtered. "I can't believe ... How can you say ... That wasn't a tantrum! And it wasn't my fault! I told you not to go to the West Wing. I told you -"
Belle had given him a sidelong look. "You're right. What was I thinking? You'd never throw a tantrum. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to hang up my cloak. — Jennifer Donnelly

And as we walk back down the street, me gingerly clutching what at this point constitutes my entire collection, my father says, 'One day, when you're all grown up and I'm not here any more, you'll remember the sunny day we went to the market together and bought a boat.' My throat feels tight because, as soon as he says it, I am already there. Standing on another street, without my father, trying to get back. And yet I'm here, with him. So I try to soak up every aspect of the moment, to help me get back when I need to. I feel the weight of the chunky parcel under my arm, and the warmth of the sun, and my father's hand in mine. I smell the flowers with their sharp undertang of cheap hot dog, and taste the slick of toffee on my teeth, and hear the chattering hagglers. I feel the joy of an adventurous Saturday with my father and no school, and I feel the sadness of looking back when it is all gone. When he is gone. — Victoria Coren

She frowned, thinking of going down there and explaining herself all over again, reliving the horror of finding Mimi's body and trying not to think of how she'd looked when they'd dragged her up and out of the ravine. No sooner had she thought it than she heard Mimi's voice, chastising her over a year ago.

"You hide from life, Catherine. Even when you're in the middle of it, standing toe to toe with all the bad guys you bring in, you manage to keep an emotional distance. I understand why you do it, but ultimately, you're the one who will suffer. You're the one who's going to grow old alone."

Cat blinked back tears, remembering what she'd told her.

I won't be alone, Mimi. I'll always have you.

Obviously she had been wrong. — Sharon Sala

What did it profit that I read the greatest human ideas of the so-called "liberal arts" in the books I got hold of. My thinking was enslaved to corrupt desires, so what difference did it make that I could read and understand these books? I delighted in learning, but I had no divine context for what my mind picked up. I had no foundation to discern what is true or certain. I was standing with my back to the light, so that the things that should be illuminated were in shadow, even though they were in front of my face. — Augustine Of Hippo

IN the morning we went up to the village and bought a wire rat-trap and fetched it down, and unstopped the best rat-hole, and in about an hour we had fifteen of the bulliest kind of ones; and then we took it and put it in a safe place under Aunt Sally's bed. But while we was gone for spiders little Thomas Franklin Benjamin Jefferson Elexander Phelps found it there, and opened the door of it to see if the rats would come out, and they did; and Aunt Sally she come in, and when we got back she was a- standing on top of the bed raising Cain, and the rats was doing what they could to keep off the dull times for her. So she took and dusted us both with the hickry, and we was as much as two hours catching another fifteen or sixteen, drat that meddlesome cub, and they warn't the likeliest, nuther, because the first haul was the pick of the flock. I never see a likelier lot of rats than what that first haul was. — Mark Twain

When the boat had gone a few oar-strokes away from land they were still standing on the beach, gazing after the boy whom an unknown woman had left naked in their arms. They were holding hands, and other people gave way before them, and I could see no one except them. Or were they perhaps so extraordinary that other people melted away and vanished into thin air around them?
When I had clambered up with my bag onto the deck of the mail-boat North Star, I saw them walking back together on their way home: on the way to our turnstile-gate; home to Brekkukot, our house which was to be razed to the ground tomorrow. They were walking hand in hand, like children. — Halldor Laxness

Real miracles bother people, like strange sudden pains unknown in medical literature. It's true: They rebut every rule all we good citizens take comfort in. Lazarus obeying orders and climbing up out of the grave - now there's a miracle, and you can bet it upset a lot of folks who were standing around at the time. When a person dies, the earth is generally unwilling to cough him back up. A miracle contradicts the will of the earth. — Leif Enger

At first I thought I saw the sun setting in the east ... Then I realized that what I saw was a full moon rising just as the sun was going down. Each of them was standing on its edge, with the most wonderful light between them. It seemed as if you could touch it, as if there were palpable currents of light passing back and forth, or if there were great taut skeins of light suspended between them ... We just stood there until the sun was down and the moon was up. They seemed to float on the horizon for quite a long time, I suppose because they were both so bright you couldn't get a clear look at them. And that grave, and my father and I, were exactly between them ... My father said, I would never have thought this place could be beautiful. I'm glad to know that. — Marilynne Robinson

There are those people who try to elevate their souls like someone who continually jumps from a standing position in the hope that forcing oneself to jump all day - and higher every day - they would no longer fall back down, but rise to heaven. Thus occupied, they no longer look to heaven. We cannot even take one step toward heaven. The vertical direction is forbidden to us. But if we look to heaven long-term, God descends and lifts us up. God lifts us up easily. As Aeschylus says, 'That which is divine is without effort.' There is an ease in salvation more difficult for us than all efforts. In one of Grimm's accounts, there is a competition of strength between a giant and a little tailor. The giant throws a stone so high that it takes a very long time before falling back down. The little tailor throws a bird that never comes back down. That which does not have wings always comes back down in the end. — Simone Weil

If you don't look at me right this minute, Brody McTavish, I'm going to ---"
He swung on her. Had she not been standing flatfooted she would have stumbled back. Instead, she was rooted to the ground as suddenly he was in her face. "I've been listening to you and I've been looking at you for years," he said, his voice deep and thick with emotion. "I've been waiting for you to grow up." His voice faltered as he dropped his horse's reins. "Because I've been wanting to do this since you were sixteen."
Grabbing her, he pulled her against his rock-hard body. His mouth dropped to hers. Her lips parted of their own accord, just as her arms wrapped around his neck. Her heart hammered against her ribs as he deepened the kiss and she heard herself moan. — B. J. Daniels

Then I began to smell it again, like each time he returned, like the day back in the spring when I rode up on the drive standing in one of his stirrups - that odor in the his clothes and beard and flesh too which I believed was the smell of powder and glory, the elected victorious but know better now: know now to have been only the will to endure, a sardonic and even humorous declining of self-delusion which is not even kin to that optimism which believes that that which is about to happen to us can possibly be the worst which we can suffer. — William Faulkner

He well knew the futility of trying to contend against witches, so he gave up discouraged. But it occurred to him that he might as well have the marble he had just thrown away, and therefore he went and made a patient search for it. But he could not find it. Now he went back to his treasure-house and carefully placed himself just as he had been standing when he tossed the marble away; then he took another marble from his pocket and tossed it in the same way, saying:
"Brother, go find your brother!"
He watched where it stopped, and went there and looked. But it must have fallen short or gone too far; so he tried twice more. The last repetition was successful. The two marbles lay within a foot of each other. — Mark Twain

The front door slammed and Dad said, "Aurora, sure you aren't expecting a package?"
I leaned back to find him army-crawling under the window in the living room. Like all dads do. "Already told you no, Rambo."
"The new mailman is back." Dad reached up and pulled the curtains closed before standing up and peeking out. "Won't come to the door."
"M shot a tranquillizer dart at the last guy." Mom gave a tired look at M who shrugged unapologetically. "The fact that there's a new one willing to be on our sidewalk is a miracle. Don't scare him off, Clyde."
Dad tried to block me when I went for the curtains. "He won't let me sign for your package. Demanded you come out in person."
"I'll get my tranq gun!" M made for her room.
"Don't you dare!" Mom chased her.
I swished back the curtains to get a look at the petrifying postman.
"I find his interest in my teenage daughter creepy," Dad grumbled.
Oh, he had no idea. — A&E Kirk

I... heard a low whistle. I jerked my head up to see Chris standing on the top of the steps next to Tristan. Pervy little boy. He leaned toward his brother, whispering loudly, "Trist, she looks really pretty!"
My cheeks burned and Tristan gave his brother a smack on the back of the head. "Shut up! She can hear you! — Renee Carter

Suddenly we were standing toe to toe. His body took up so much space around me it was hard to breathe. I could feel his heat and we weren't even touching. What had just happened? Kyle saw the overwhelmed look in my eyes and smirked. He brought his mouth down to mine and brushed my lips with a touch so feather-light that I gasped. My body reacted before my head could. I drifted into him as if he was somehow my new center of gravity. My eyes fluttered shut, and I waited for a kiss that never came. His lips were there, brushing back and forth over mine, teasing me cruelly until I ached with a desire so intense I started to shake. Kyle chuckled darkly. You're in over your head with me, Virgin Val. — Kelly Oram

I love you, Jackson James. I love you. I love-"
His arms tightened again and his deep growl rumbling out of his chest silenced me. Our gazes locked. "I need to be in you. Now."
My eyes widened.
"No time to go home." Then he took one of my hands and started walking back toward the hotel entrance.
"Jax?"
He looked down at me, his eyes full of hunger. "No time."
...
We ended up back in the hotel, standing in front of a wide-eyes hotel clerk. "I need a room." Jax said, smacking down his wallet. "Now. — J. Lynn

Lost ye way in the dark, said the old man. He stirred the fire, standing slender tusks of bone up out of the ashes.
The kid didn't answer.
The old man swung his head back and forth. The way of the transgressor is hard. God made this world, but he didnt make it to suit everbody, did he?
I don't believe he much had me in mind. — Cormac McCarthy

If you've never been through it, you can't understand it, not really. Lucky you, I say. Control is about fear, see. If you're afraid of the reprisals, you don't say no, you don't fight back, you don't run away. Saying yes is how you survive. It becomes normal. Horrible, but normal. Horrible, because it's normal. Now, lucky you can say, 'Not standing up to him is giving him permission,' but if you've been fed this diet since the year dot, there is no standing up. Victims aren't cowards. Outsiders, like, they never have a clue how brave you have to be to carry on. — David Mitchell

A clever Zen teacher might say that standing back and letting the monastery burn belies a kind of attachment to the idea of nonattachment, that trying to save it when it could all burn anyway is true nonattachment. In trying to save Tassajara from the fire - or your own life from disaster - you can't be sure you will. In fact, you can lose everything you love in a moment. And that's not a reason to give up. If anything, it's a reason to turn toward the fire, recognizing it as a force of both creation and destruction, and to take care of what's right in front of you, because that's all you actually have. — Colleen Morton Busch

Would it be possible for me to see something from up there?" asked Milo politely.
"You could," said Alec, "but only if you try very hard to look at things as an adult does."
Milo tried as hard as he could, and, as he did, his feet floated slowly off the ground until he was standing in the air next to Alex Bings. He looked around very quickly and, an instant later, crashed back down to the earth again.
"Interesting, wasn't it?" asked Alex.
"Yes, it was," agreed Milo, rubbing his head and dusting himself off, "but I think I'll continue to see things as a child. It's not so far to fall. — Norton Juster

Don't back down just to keep the peace. Standing up for yourself builds self confidence and self esteem. — Oprah Winfrey

When I look up, there are women as far as I can see, standing in the river one behind the other, generations going back to the beginning time, from the very womb of God. — Jonathan Odell

I'll go first. I dare Kope to kiss Anna.
It's like a monk kissing a nun. Brilliant. I lean back and cross my arms, enjoying their shifty-eyed embarrassment. Anna suddenly stands, I'm assuming to get far away from me, but instead she heads straight for me and kicks my chair up. I lose my balance and topple backward like an idiot. But when I look up and see her standing over me with eyes ablaze, I can only grin.
There's my girl. I'm relieved I've made her feel something. — Wendy Higgins