Tile Quotes & Sayings

The floor of ice cream parlor bothered me. It was black-and-white checkboard tile, bigger than supermarket checkboard. If I looked only at a white square, I would be all right, but it was hard to ignore the black squares that surrounded the white ones. The contrast got under my skin. The floor meant yes, no, this, that, up, down, day, night -all the indecisions and opposites that were bad enough in life without having them spelled out for you on the floor. — Susanna Kaysen

To treat things with respect and intrigue, we don't need to understand their motivations and inner lives - whatever knowing the inner life of a tangelo or a floor tile would mean.4 We just need to pay enough attention to discover what they do and how they work - to discover what they obviously and truly are - and then to make use of them in gratifyingly novel ways. And — Ian Bogost

GENERAL RAGINSKY: Mr. President, in order to exhaust fully the presentation of evidence in regard to the subject-matter of my report, I ask your permission to examine witness Josif Abgarovitch Orbeli - Tatiana dropped the cup of tea she was drinking, and it fell on the tile floor and broke, and Tatiana fell on the floor, too, on her knees, and began to pick up the pieces, every moment or so emitting cries of such distress that Vikki, who was nearby, jumped up, backed away and said in a stunned voice, "What's wrong with you?" Tatiana waved her off with one hand, her other hand holding a ceramic shard which covered her mouth as she continued to listen to the bare echo that was the radio broadcast as it ceaselessly continued. A crash on the road, but the radio still plays music, still transmits sounds no matter how incongruous it is that the ear can somehow hear, that the brain can somehow listen - — Paullina Simons

But I can't leave, not yet. I'll stay with her until sunrise. If I brace my feet, I won't slide. I can rest my cheek on the roof tile and still see her. Pacing. Pulling her hair.
"I'll fix you," I tell her. "I promise."
Even though I don't know how.
It's better than good-bye. — Pam Bachorz

He saw her draw closer in the mirror. Her black hair was an ink splash against the white tile walls. She paused behind him. "You protected me, Kaz."
"The fact that you're bleeding through your bandages tells me otherwise."
She glanced down. A red blossom of blood had spread on the bandage tied around her shoulder. She tugged awkwardly at the strip of towel. "I need Nina to fix this one."
He didn't mean to say it. He meant to let her go. "I can help you."
Her gaze snapped to his in the mirror, wary as if gauging an opponent. I can help you. They were the first words she'd spoken to him, standing in the parlor of the Menagerie, draped in purple silk, eyes lined in kohl. She had helped him. And she'd nearly destroyed him. Maybe he should let her finish the job. — Leigh Bardugo

Later, I was in a bathroom stall. Eric was on his knees. My dick was in his mouth, my head back against warm ceramic tile that shook with the beat of the music. My fingers were in his hair and everything was hot and wet. I grunted a warning and he backed away, jacking me until I came on the dirty floor. He stood up and kissed me while he jerked himself off. He sighed into my mouth. He tasted like stale beer and mint. He came on his hand. I felt raw. "Thanks," he said, zipping up his pants. "That was great." "Sure," I said, because I was unsure of what else to say. "You too." And then he left. I — T.J. Klune

It was my mother who taught me the one worthwhile thing: when they ask if you like what you see in the mirror, pretend that what they mean is what's behind you
the shower curtain, the tile, the wallpaper, whatever's there. — Gary Lutz

But what sent his face clear down off his skull and broke him in two, though, was he said when he saw the Pam-shiny empty biscuit pan on top of the stove and the plastic rind of the peanut butter's safety-seal wrap on top of the wastebasket's tall pile. The little locket-picture in the back of his head swelled and became a sharp-focused scene of his wife and little girl and little unborn child eating what he now could see they must have eaten, last night and this morning, while he was out ingesting their groceries and rent. This was his cliff-edge, his personal intersection of choice, standing there loose-faced in the kitchen, running his finger around a shiny pan with not one little crumb of biscuit left in it. He sat down on the kitchen tile with his scary eyes shut tight but still seeing his little girl's face. They'd ate some charity peanut butter on biscuits washed down with tapwater and a grimace. — David Foster Wallace

The door to the situation room door opened, drawing her attention to a tall, lean man with eyes as sharp as razors.
The sound of a metal chair scraping on the tile floor filled the room as Reed shot to his feet, stood at attention, and saluted crisply.
The man stopped, scowled, and heaved a heavy sigh. "All right you clown. At ease. It hasn't been that long since I've been here."
"Just showing my respect, sir," Reed said with a smart-ass grin. "It's not often we're fortunate enough to be in the company of such greatness. — Cindy Gerard

Colter searched for original Mexican tiles to use as patterns for copies, and during the search, a barrel of old tile letters was found in a cellar corner. She decided to use the letters on the walls of the Cocina Cantina to spell out old Spanish proverbs about eating and drinking. Above the bar was "A vuestra salud" [to your health], and in another room, "Not with whom you were born, but with whom you pasture. — Virginia L. Grattan

I can install toilets. I know all about the wax ring. I can tile floors. I'm learning how to do basic wiring. — Sandra Bullock

There was Babylon and Nineveh; they were built of brick. Athens was gold marble columns. Rome was held up on broad arches of rubble. In Constantinople the minarets flame like great candles round the Golden Horn ... Steel, glass, tile, concrete will be the materials of the skyscraper. Crammed on the narrow island the millionwindowed buildings will just glittering, pyramid on pyramid like the white cloudhead above a thunderstorm. — John Dos Passos

The ice tinkles prettily: There's no more inviting sound to her, it's sophistication, like a British accent or that call-and-response of high-heeled shoes on tile. — Rumaan Alam

'Rent-a-tile' means when you go to a dance hall, some people take the middle of the dance floor and do their thing. — Sean Paul

Elwood had thoughtfully fed Patrick. There was a clean-licked plate on the kitchen tile. Patrick was curled up before a gas fireplace, though there was no fire. — Michael Grant

The place I like best in this world is the kitchen. No matter where it is, no matter what kind, if it's a kitchen, if it's a place where they make food, it's fine with me. Ideally it should be well broken in. Lots of tea towels, dry and immaculate. Where tile catching the light (ting! Ting!) — Banana Yoshimoto

Hannah kept her eyes forward, trained on two rows of rusted showerheads stuck in facing walls. Sixteen in all. The room was paved with white tile, chipped and discolored by age and use. — Rebecca Forster

The Missing Tile syndrome is ubiquitous. If you are overweight, all you see are flat stomachs and perfect physical specimens. If you have pimples, all you see is flawless skin. Women who have difficulty getting pregnant walk around seeing only pregnant women and babies. Nor do you need to be overweight, have pimples, be balding, or want a child to believe that you have a missing tile. You can allow any real - or merely perceived - flaw to diminish your happiness. — Dennis Prager

Thanks for staying with me last night," I said, stroking Toto's soft fur. "You didn't have to sleep on the bathroom floor."
"Last night was one of the best nights of my life."
I turned to see his expression. When I saw that he was serious, I shot him a dubious look. "Sleeping in between the toilet and the tub on a cold, hard tile floor with a vomiting idiot was one of your best nights? That's sad, Trav."
"No, sitting up with you when you're sick, and you falling asleep in my lap was one of my best nights. It wasn't comfortable, I didn't sleep worth a shit, but I brought in your nineteenth birthday with you, and you're actually pretty sweet when you're drunk."
"I'm sure between the heaving and purging I was very charming."
He pulled me close, patting Toto who was snuggled up to my neck. "You're the only woman I know that still looks incredible with your head in the toilet. That's saying something. — Jamie McGuire

She stared at the faded tile floor before her feet, but knew his every step around her small kitchen. When Martin touched the coffee cup patterned curtains he must assume she'd made, her fingers throbbed. When his eyes slid across the flowery aluminum water bottle at the table, her throat cracked with thirst.
The radio clicked off.
The silence of the room soaked up her raspy breaths, her pounding heart, her ache, and stirred them around the one man she ever longed for in a way that changes how you taste the world.
Her desire swirled in a pulsing, betraying, blurry hook, and encouraged him to move closer.
Martin obeyed. — Kim Bongiorno

Part of our skittishness about Christian perfection is linguistic confusion. The English word "perfect" has absorbed the Greek notion of "teleos". When the Greeks looked at a building's blueprint, they pictured the building whole and complete. They envisioned the blueprint finished down to the bathroom tile and announced, "Ah, this is perfect." The problem is that "teleos" suggests that perfection is something we can build or achieve. The Hebrews looked at the same blueprint more practically. They envisioned the process of building from hard hats to hammers, from scaffolding to skylights. "Ah," the Hebrews said. "This is perfect." The Hebrews and the early Christians understood perfection as a process, not a product. Our identity as Christians depends upon life lived in relationship with God, not upon the quality of our achievements. — Kenda Creasy Dean

If two people see a fairy appear, eat a starfish, and dive into the tile floor without so much as a splash, neither can accuse the other of lunacy. — Kaydeon K. Moore

STARS AND DANDELIONS
Deep in the blue sky,
like pebbles at the bottom of the sea,
lie the stars unseen in daylight
until night comes.
You can't see them, but they are there.
Unseen things are still there.

The withered, seedless dandelions
hidden in the cracks of the roof tile
wait silently for spring,
their strong roots unseen.
You can't see them, but they are there.
Unseen things are still there. — Misuzu Kaneko

For as from the same piece of clay a potter may fashion either a pot or a tile, so the Devil may shape a witch into a wolf or a cat or even a goat, without subtracting from her and without adding to her at all. For this occurs just as clay is first molded into one, then shaped into another form, for the Devil is a potter and his witches are but clay. — Aino Kallas

Rubashov had always believed that he knew himself rather well. Being without moral prejudices, he had no illusions about the phenomenon called the "first person singular" and had taken for granted, without particular emotion, that this phenomenon was endowed with certain impulses which people are generally reluctant to admit. Now, when he stood with his forehead against the window or suddenly stopped on the third black tile, he made unexpected discoveries. He found that those processes wrongly known as monologues are really dialogues of a special kind - dialogues in which one partner remains silent while the other, against all grammatical rules, addresses him as "I" instead of "you," in order to creep into his confidence and to fathom his intentions, but the silent partner just remains silent, shuns observation, and even refuses to be localized in time and space. — Arthur Koestler

Landowner of those parts. An archway to one side leads to a church, the Madonna del Carmine - Our Lady of Mount Carmine. Narrow stone steps run up the hillside, flanked by closely clustered two-story stone houses with red-tile roofs. For centuries, the paesani of Roseto — Malcolm Gladwell

She worked briskly and efficiently, taking her brush and pan from the drawing-room to the top of the stairs and making her way back down, a step at a time; after that she filled a bucket with water, fetched her kneeling-mat, and began to wash the hall floor. Vinegar was all she used. Soap left streaks on the black tiles. The first, wet rub was important for loosening the dirt, but it was the second bit that really counted, passing the wrung cloth over the floor in one supple, unbroken movement ... There! How pleasing each glossy tile was. The gloss would fade in about five minutes as the surface dried; but everything faded. The vital thing was to make the most of the moments of brightness. There was no point dwelling on the scuffs. — Sarah Waters

Last night was one of the best nights of my life."

"Sleeping in between the toilet an the tub on a cold, hard tile floor with a vomiting idiot was one of our best nights? That's sad, Trav. — Jamie McGuire

Cookie dropped her purse and tried to catch it midair. In the process, she knocked over a vase. When she lunged for the vase, she slipped on the tile and overturned an entire table. A lovely handblown piece of glass flew in my direction, and all I could think as I caught it was, Really? Again? We were going to have to practice muscle control. — Darynda Jones

My heels click on the tile floor, and I feel like a velociraptor. — Lily Paradis

Sam counts the money carefully. I watch him in the mirror. "You know what I wish?" he asks when he's done.
"What?"
"That someone would convert my bed into a robot that would fight other bed robots to the death for me."
That startles a laugh out of me. "That would be pretty awesome."
A slow, shy smile spreads across his mouth. "And we could take bets on them. And be filthy rich."
I lean my head against the frame of the stall, looking at the tile wall and the pattern of yellowed cracks there, and grin. "I take back anything I might have
implied to the contrary. Sam, you are a genius. — Holly Black

Well, looks like you got your wish, Firebrand," I whispered, feeling the heat in my veins rise up, growing hotter by the second. "Screw this waiting around. If we survive this, I swear you will have my full attention from now on."
Her eyes flashed, and I released the hold on my true self, letting Cobalt surge to the surface. My wings unfurled, brushing the countertop, and my talons clicked on the tile floor as I sank down and made myself small, folding my wings tight to my body — Julie Kagawa

At least it was instant. At least there wasn't any pain.
I knew he was only trying to help, but he didn't get it.
There was pain. A dul endless pain in my gut that wouldn't go away even when I knelt on the stingingly frozen tile of the bathroom, dry-heaving. — John Green

The wife picked out ceramic tile for floor covering, not realizing that cost was determined by square foot, not square yard like carpet. Thinking the price was plenty reasonable, she had an extra room of tile ordered for installation. When the bill arrived, it was staggering. She and her husband began a fight that continued all through the construction job. They ended up divorced, but not until she had broken every window. — Jim Harrison

It may be that actual tears have stained the tile floors or soaked into the carpets of such places. It may be that these tears can never be removed. And everywhere the odor of melancholy, that is the very odor of memory. — Joyce Carol Oates

IN EUROPE, I vomited into small buckets and brushed my teeth repeatedly with chalky British toothpaste. I lay prone on the bathroom floors of several museums, feeling the cold tile underneath my cheek as my brain liquefied and seeped out my ear, bubbling. Migraines left my blood spreading across unfamiliar hotel sheets, dripping on the floors, oozing into carpets, soaking through leftover croissants and Italian lace cookies. — E. Lockhart

Nature wasn't for us to rise above. It was for us to sink into; to sleep upon and go bootless, and in silent protest to walk the finest rugs and fanciest tile and leave our naked, muddy footprints as the signatures of new beginnings. — Kim Heacox

She looked around for a place to be. A small place. The closet? ... It was both small and bright, and she wanted to be in a very small, very bright place. Small enough to contain her grief.Bright enough to throw into relief the dark things that cluttered her.Once inside, she sank to the tile floor next to the toilet. On her knees, her hand on the cold rim of the bathtub, she waited for something to happen ... inside. — Toni Morrison

On Wednesday, July 19, the Council, having gleaned and discerned, released its official verdict: the fall of the tile bearing the letter "Z" constitutes the terrestrial manifestation of an empyrean Nollopian desire, that desire most surely being that the letter "Z" should be utterly excised
fully extirpated
absolutively heave-ho'ed from our communal vocabulary! — Mark Dunn

Despite the mosque's perfection as a whole, it contained many deliberate mistakes in the symmetry of the tile work in order to symbolize the craftsman's humility and his insignificance when compared to Allah. — Jamie Maslin

When she sat down on the tile next to him, unafraid, his kaleidoscope senses drank in the years that had been printed onto her mind before she was old enough to remember, and he told her a story, projecting into her darkness sensations of light and color and shape, butterflies swirling like silk-spun gold out through a window that opened to a big green field in the days before the bomb. — Mel Paisley

With blue vinyl-tile floor, pale-green wainscoating, pink walls, a yellow ceiling, and orange-and-white stork-patterned drapes, the expectant fathers' lounge churned with the negative energy of color overload. It would have served well as the nervous-making set for a nightmare about a children's-show host who led a secret life as an ax murderer. The chain-smoking clown didn't improve the ambience. — Dean Koontz

I worked in Dad's stores, moving boxes - I remember quite well one stockroom that was upstairs - sweeping floors, laying tile. I also had paper routes. — S. Robson Walton

You either fainted or you wanted a much closer look at the cracks in the tile. Either way, you hit hard."
"Seriously?"
He nodded. "Maybe you shouldn't have been trying to make out with him," he suggested.
How did he know that? "I was kissing him good-bye."
He snorted and exchanged glances with the nurse. "That's not what it looked like to me."
Probably not. But what happened? Could Reyes Farrow take control over me even from a freaking coma? I was doomed. — Darynda Jones

As he walked, he knew the bathroom instantly because of the reflective tile floor. Hers would be the last door again. As he took another step forward, he could see a sliver of skin cut by the light, reflecting a glimpse of her pale skin. It served as a beacon to him, an invitation to touch something that would only belong to him. Could only be his. — Arden Aoide

My boyfriend likes to fuck my brains out on our kitchen island. Which tile would you recommend for that? — Alice Clayton

A joyful task,' he says and she realizes that he welcomes the idea of years of searching, tile by tile, inscription by inscription, cornice by cornice and niche by niche, that the painstaking search of Sinan's greatest achievement, decades long, is the holy task; that the secret letter is cut in every stone and tile. By the time you find it, you have realized the supreme unimportance of finding it. A Sufi lesson. — Ian McDonald

Neath tile or thatch That man is rich Who has a scratch For every itch. — Ogden Nash

Young people, don't get the idea that you have an artistic temperament which must be humored. Don't believe you cannot do good work unless you feel in tile mood for it. That is all nonsense. I frequently have to force myself to make a start in the morning; but after a short while I find I can work. Only hard and regular work will bring success. — Howard Pyle

Wives are good on paper, at least. until they turn into harpies with sharp claws and open check books. Then they're kind of frightening. And they put on all kinds of makeup and parade around the street with their shopping cart yelling "Sale on aisle seven!" at anyone who will listen. Their wooden clog sandals make a helluva racket on linoleum tile. Their plastic jewelry clatters like the bones of little children. — Rob Campbell

My palms flat against the wall of the tile, I clenched my eyes shut. "Please come back" I said quietly. She couldn't hear me, but it didn't stop me from wishing she would come and save me from the terrible pain I felt without her there. — Jamie McGuire

This is the last time we have breakfast together:
our warm coffee mugs on the kitchen table
our cold bare feet on the blue tile — Malak El Halabi

In the deserted men's restroom at the back of Middleton Community College, Sam Keller knelt on the tile, braced his hands against Keith Jameson's thighs, and broke his mother's heart. — Heidi Cullinan

We can deeply love our poison. We can love the taste of it, the scent of it, the comforting weight of it in our belly and find ourselves woken in the night with stabbing cramps, arms around porcelain toilet bowls, hurling every last bit until collapsing on bathroom tile, limp from dehydration. Sometimes parting with love is essential for survival. I've found the most tragic aspect of losing loved ones wasn't the big boom of the fallout, but realizing later how much healthier I was without them. — Maggie Young

In all the ills that befall us, we are more concerned by the intention than the result. A tile that falls off a roof may injure us more seriously, but it will not wound us so deeply as a stone thrown deliberately by a malevolent hand. The blow may miss, but the intention always strikes home. — Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Of all ridiculous things the most ridiculous seems to me, to be busy - to be a man who is brisk about his food and his work. Therefore, whenever I see a fly settling, in the decisive moment, on the nose of such a person of affairs; or if he is spattered with mud from a carriage which drives past him in still greater haste; or the drawbridge opens up before him; or a tile falls down and knocks him dead, then I laugh heartily. — Soren Kierkegaard

So it is not a matter of whether it is possible to attain Buddhahood, or if it is possible to make a tile a jewel. But just to work, just to live in this world with this understanding is the most important point, and that is our practice. That is true zazen. — Shunryu Suzuki

You'd think someone who could see the beauty in nature and capture it on canvas could see mold on the shower tile. — Beverley Andi

Her forehead fell to rest on the tile, her eyes burning, flooding, overflowing with the pain he seemed unable to express and she couldn't escape. — Catherine Mann

I learned mainly through television, but I learned how to do mosaic, where you can buy stones or things of that nature. But also where you bust the tile to decorate pots for flowers or table tops. Lots of different things. Wherever you want it, you can mosaic just about anything. It took me about two weeks to do a big birdbath. — Barbara Mandrell

Everyone in my family has some kind of artistic tendency. My great grandmother was a jewelry designer, and her daughter was a ceramic tile muralist. — Nikki Reed

My last moments on earth would be spent in a Golden Nugget bathtub with crushed beer cans scattered across my faux Venetian tile and acrylic bearskin rug. — Lindsay Mark Lewis

Sophie isn't leaving," Quentin asserted, his voice pure steel. "That woman sheds grace and light in every room she enters. Any man with a functional brain would try to catch a fragment of that grace and cherish it, rather than push her aside. I'm not sending her away. Were it in my power, I would cut the moon out of the sky and give it to her on a silver platter." Her notebook dropped from her nerveless fingers, splatting open on the tile floor. Quentin whirled around to see her standing in the doorway. If he was embarrassed to have been overheard, he gave no sign of it. On the contrary, his eyes that had been sparking with anger gentled the instant he saw her. She glanced away, rocked by the protective expression on Quentin's face. It shot straight to a vulnerable part deep inside and enveloped her with a sense of well-being. No man had ever spoken so passionately on her behalf, and a rush of wild, electrifying emotions stirred inside. — Elizabeth Camden

Come, see the north-wind's masonry, Out of an unseen quarry evermore Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer Curves his white bastions with projected roof Round every windward stake, or tree, or door. Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work So fanciful, so savage, naught cares he For number or proportion. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

That's the thing about angry words - once you spill them out, they are like a broken jar of honey on the floor, all sticky and mess. And no matter how hard you try to clean it up, you can always feel that sticky part of the tile" -Cordie — Shelley Moore Thomas

It has taken me twenty-eight years to be able to admit that I'm glad I did not know my mother until now. Not because, as my father suspected, she would ruin my life, but because this way, I did not have to bear witness as she ruined hers.
My mother's sorrow is so powerful, it cracks the clay tile beneath her feet; it makes the water in the fountain behind us overflow. "Delia," she says, as her eyes fill with tears. "I'm trying."
"Me, too." I reach for her hand: a compromise, a good-bye. Maybe this is as good as it gets. — Jodi Picoult

You can't climb a tile wall. — Bill Engvall

I prefer to sing in the shower 'cause the acoustics are really, really good, I mean, when you're singing against the tile walls then you really hear yourself, hear your voice, you know, throwing itself back at you. — Thia Megia

Anne has small superstitions which she uses to dispel anxieties. For instance, if she can make it to the fourth stain on the carpet by the time the elevator door closes, that means Nate has thought positively about her today, and there is a future where they know each other. It becomes a one-sided competition when a negative consequence is imagined: if she cannot touch two different kinds of tile with her feet by the time the toilet flushes, that means she said something crucially "wrong" in an email, and Nate will never contact her again. She doesn't keep track of which side is winning. — Megan Boyle

We had pale yellow tile in our bathroom rimmed with thin tiles of white. I'd dumped Tack's old, mismatched towels and added new, thick emerald green ones. They were hanging on the towel rack.
My eyes moved.
My moisturizer and toner bottles were the deep hued color of moss. My toothbrush was bright pink, Tack's was electric blue. There was a little bowl by the tap where I tossed my jewelry when I was washing my hands or preparing for bed. It was ceramic painted in glossy sunshine yellow and grass green. My eyes went to the mirror. My undies were cherry red lace.
I grinned at myself in the mirror.
I lived in color, every day, and my life was vibrant.
I rubbed in moisturizer hoping our baby got his or her Dad's sapphire blue eyes.
But I'd settle if they were my green. — Kristen Ashley

Patriotism , as a feeling of exclusive love for one's own people, and as a doctrine of tile virtue of sacrificing one's tranquillity, one's property, and ever, one's life, in defence of one's own people from slaughter and outrage by their enemies, was the highest idea of the period when each nation considered it feasible and just, for its own advantage, to subject to slaughter and outrage the people of other nations. — Leo Tolstoy

But this book is about something else: what goes on in the lives of real people when the industrial economy goes south. It's about reacting to bad circumstances in the worst way possible. It's about a culture that increasingly encourages social decay instead of counteracting it. The problems that I saw at the tile warehouse run far deeper than macroeconomic trends and policy. too many young men immune to hard work. Good jobs impossible to fill for any length of time. And a young man [one of Vance's co-workers] with every reason to work - a wife-to-be to support and a baby on the way - carelessly tossing aside a good job with excellent health insurance. More troublingly, when it was all over, he thought something had been done to him. There is a lack of agency here - a feeling that you have little control over your life and a willingness to blame everyone but yourself. This is distinct from the larger economic landscape of modern America. — J.D. Vance

The pebbled glass door panel is lettered in flaked black paint: "Philip Marlowe ... Investigations." It is a reasonably shabby door at the end of a reasonably shabby corridor in the sort of building that was new about the year the all-tile bathroom became the basis of civilization. The door is locked, but next to it is another door with same legend which is not locked. Come on in
there's nobody here but me an a big bluebottle fly. But not if you're from Manhattan, Kansas. — Raymond Chandler

Lying flat against the tile of the kitchen floor listening to someone else have sex is essentially my early twenties in a nutshell. — David Rakoff

If I had to pick one artist to tile my bathroom I would go with MC Escher. — Demetri Martin

You're not very good at this," Emma said, laughing at the frustration on Sean's face.
He pulled his hand out from under the back of her T-shirt. "You're distracting me."
"How am I distracting you?" She shook the bag at Sean, reminding him to pull two letter tiles to replace the C and the T he'd used to make CAT.
"You look totally hot. And you did it on purpose so I wouldn't be able to concentrate and you'd win."
Emma laughed. Sure, she'd thrown on baggy flannel boxers and an old Red Sox T-shirt after her shower just to seduce him out of triple-word scores. "You not having a shirt on is distracting. And you keep pretending you want to rub my back so you can peek at my tile rack."
"Nothing wrong with checking out your rack." He craned his neck to see better and she shoved him away. It wasn't easy playing Scrabble sitting side by side on the couch, but after a long workday, neither was willing to take the floor. — Shannon Stacey

On its rocky tip, dominating the scenery for miles around, stood he Villa dell'Ossevatore. Breathtakingly beautiful, it comprised three individual buildings and a single watchtower, roofed in terracotta tile and connected by stone bridges and loggias. Its lush gardens and lawns encircled the peninsula in steadily descending terraces, and a wide stone-built staircase hugged the rock all the way down to the waterline, terminating at a landing stage edged with balustrades. Higher up the hillside she saw the pergolas straining under the branches of ancient wisteria, and huge displays of azaleas and camellias. Ivy clung to the west-facing sides of the buildings and curled among its statues. — Stephen Lloyd Jones

The 'bath' was almost the size of a small swimming pool, the steam curling off it pure, sensual temptation. A shower stood to her right, but it had no glass walls, the area defined only by an expanse of gold-flecked tile. A lightbulb went off in her head. 'Wings,' she whispered. 'It's all to accommodate those beautiful wings. — Nalini Singh

The clear water rippled gently, licking the line of fresh blue tile around its rim like a liquid puppy waiting to be played with. — N.D. Wilson

Sicarius padded toward the exit, his soft black boots silent on the tile floor. He paused in the doorway and glanced at the backs of the two older men.
The emperor emitted a nervous chuckle. "You trained him too well, Hollow. The man bothers me."
"He is loyal."
"I know. You did a good job. I ought to give you Sespian to work with. The boy is disappointing."
"He does seem soft," Hollowcrest said.
"Did you hear that scream? I would've been fascinated by severed heads at that age."
"You're fascinated with them now, Sire."
"True enough."
They shared a laugh and headed for the door. Sicarius slipped away before they noticed him. — Lindsay Buroker

Go on, just come out with it, whatever it is." She braced herself against the counter.
Peter glanced down at the tile floor, and then back up at her, and sighed. "Fine. Here it is. Do you think Witches could have killed my father? — Deborah Blake

I turned to see his expression. When I saw that he was serious, I shot hum a dubious look. "Sleeping in between the toilet and the tub on a cold, hard tile floor with a vomiting idiot was one of your best nights? That's sad, Trav."
"No, sitting up with you when you're sick and you falling asleep in my lap was one of my best night." ( ... ) "Thanks, Trav. I won't make you babysit me again."
He leaned against his pillow. "Whatever. No one can hold your hair back like I can. — Jamie McGuire

Pulling her wrist from his mouth was as hard as turning from the gates of paradise. She fell back off the bed and sat down hard on the tile floor. The vampire snarled and rose to a crouch, silhouetted by the last rays of the setting sun. Her blood stained his lips and his chin. "What the hell were you doing?" Cat's mouth fell open. "What. I mean." He wiped the blood off his chin with his fingers and regarded it in fascination and disgust. "Seriously, woman. What is wrong with you? Haven't you ever heard of consent?" She — Max Gladstone

Abruptly, Elliot startles us all by standing and pulling his chair back so it scrapes across the tile floor. All eyes turn to him. He gazes down at Kate for one moment and then drops to one knee beside her.
Oh. My. God.
He reaches for her hand, and silence settles like a blanket over the entire restaurant as everyone stops eating, stops talking, stops walking, and stares.
"My beautiful Kate, I love you. Your grace, your beauty, and your fiery spirit have no equal, and you have captured my heart. Spend your life with me. Marry me."
Holy shit! — E.L. James

And yet I could still hear them. As if some part of their essence had evaporated into the air, become a part of this place, ingrained, like the scent of cigarettes and burning sugar, in the woodwork and plaster. Everything was buzzing with that vanished presence, buzzing and singing and laughing louder than ever before, stone and tile and polished wood, all whispering with agitation and excitement; never still, never silent. — Joanne Harris

Turning off all the lights, I went into the bathroom and closed the door. I stood in the darkness before the mirror, my hand on the light switch. I forced myself to flick it on.
In the flood of light against white tile, the face and shoulders of a strange
a fierce, bald, very dark Negro
glared at me from the glass. He in no way resembled me.
The transformation was total and shocking. I had expected to see myself disguised, but this was something else. I was imprisoned in the flesh of an utter stranger, an unsympathetic one with whom I felt no kinship. All traces of the John Griffin I had been were wiped from existence. — John Howard Griffin

Worrying is like a dominoes effect, that rolls from one day into the next, into a week, a month, a year;
never accomplishing anything but stress, until it hits that last tile, which drops unfulfilled to an empty ground. — Anthony Liccione

They used to tease me at the 'Oprah' show, 'Are you really going to do another white Shaker kitchen, with white subway tile and stainless steel appliances?' And my answer is, 'I can vary it a bit, but I'm never going to err from classic materials.' — Nate Berkus

A few seconds of silence lapse, and I knew Carter was waiting for me to mention the huge "I'm pregnant" elephant in the room. Fuck that elephant! he can just sit there in the corner eating peanuts and shitting on the tile while giving me looks of disgust. — Tara Sivec

Often, I grow irritated before the first tile has been placed on the Scrabble board. This generally occurs when one of my opponents has insisted upon bringing a dictionary to the table, making it clear that he will be consulting it throughout the game. — Craig Brown

In these days of intellectual awakening and steadily asserting public opinion, the holy places of the Hindus, their condition, and method of work have not escaped tile keen eye of criticism; and this city, being the holy of holies to all Hindus, has not failed to attract its full share of censure. — Swami Vivekananda

Sometimes I feel like one of those sliding tile puzzles. I just get so dang close to what I want to see in the mirror and who I want to be ... but then I have to completely jumble up the pieces to try to get even closer. — Erica Goros

When one is undone - sprawled across the cold tile of a public bathroom in a pool of one's own vomit, or shivering in the back of a taxi in a pair of urine-soaked skinny jeans with no money for cab fare and a dead cell phone battery - much like a wobbly toddler or an unhinged politician, one immediately looks for someone else to blame. God. Your parents. Ex-girlfriends. Undocumented immigrants. Marvin in Human Resources. China. — Aisha Tyler

Run! Helena cried and ran down the staircase. Maryse took the steps two at a time, passing Helena on the way, and almost fell as she hit the foyer floor. The scream of police sirens was far too close for comfort, and Maryse struggled to pick up the pace. Skidding on the polished wood, she dashed around the corner and onto the textured tile in the kitchen, where her shoes had a much better grip and she picked up some speed. She ran into the laundry room, shoving down the window where she'd entered the house. Then she rushed out the side door, locking it before she slammed it behind her. She made for the huge hedge of bushes that separated Helena — Jana Deleon

She counts the tiles on the
cold bathroom floor
lays her secrets out like stones
square by square
tile by tile
she doesn't feel anymore. — Diana Rasmussen

There are no mistakes in Zentangle, so there is no need for an eraser. If you do not like the look of a stroke you have made, it then becomes only an opportunity to create a new tangle, or transform it using an old trusty pattern. A Zentangle tile is meant to be a surprise that unfolds before the creator's eyes, one stroke at a time. — Beckah Krahula

Holy is the dish and drain, the soap and sink, and the cup and plate and the warm wool socks, and the cold white tile, showerheads and good dry towelsand frying eggs sound like psalms, with bits of salt measured in my palm. It's all a part of a sacrament, as holy as a day is spent ... — Carrie Newcomer

Later that night, when we left the prayer room, we felt something in Upper Room shift. Couldn't explain it, something just felt different. We knew the walls of Upper Room like the walls of our own homes. We'd soft-stepped down hallways as the choir practiced, noticing that corner in front of the instrument closet where the paint had chipped, or the tile in the ladies' room that had been laid crooked. We'd spend decades studying the splotch that looked like an elephant's ear on the ceiling above the water fountain. And we knew the exact spot on the sanctuary carpet where Elise Turner had knelt the night before she killed herself. (The more spiritual of us even swore they could still see the indented curve from her knees.) Sometimes we joked that when we died, we'd all become part of these walls, pressed down flat like wallpaper. — Brit Bennett

Fine, dandy, she thought. Then lose the shirt, peel off those leather pants, and lie down on my tile. We'll take turns being on the bottom. — J.R. Ward

Echoing off the tile walls, the sizzle-splash of the falling water sounded like the hissing of serpents and the brittle laughter of strange children. — Dean Koontz