You Didn't Even Try Quotes & Sayings

Many people are afraid to fail, so they don't try. They may dream, talk, and even plan, but they don't take that critical step of putting their money and their effort on the line. To succeed in business, you must take risks. Even if you fail, that's how you learn. There has never been, and will never be, an Olympic skater who didn't fall on the ice. — Donald Trump

What happens when you give people a 2nd chance? They blame you for it. What happens when you give people a 3rd chance? They ridicule you. What happens when you give them a 4th chance? They make sure they will have a 5th. What happens when you give them a 5th? They blame you for everything and laugh at you. What happens when you give them a 6th? At this point, they try to kill you by accident before you even have another chance of living them. What happens when you give them a 7th chance? They punish you for all the chances you have given them before and betray you in the most horrible way they can, proving that they didn't deserve not even one chance at anything. Forgiveness is not for everyone, and those that deserve it never reach the point of even needing it. — Robin Sacredfire

Hey, bro, do you think you can put Shorty back on her chain?"
I stepped forward with my hands on my hips, only slightly intimidated to find Kaleb almost eye level with me when he was seated and I was standing.
"First of all, no one is the boss of me but me. Secondly, if you ever reference my 'chain' again, I will kick your ass." I jabbed him hard in the chest with my finger. Possibly breaking it. "And thirdly, don't call me Shorty."
Kaleb sat silently for a second, his eyes wide as he looked at Michael. "Where did you get her? Can you get me one?"
I blew out a loud, frustrated sigh and dropped down beside Michael, who didn't even try to hide his smile. "You should probably apologize to Emerson."
"I am sorry." Kaleb grinned at me. "Sorry I didn't meet you first. — Myra McEntire

So you're Zach." Townsend didn't even try to hide the judgement in his voice as he looked Zach up and down in some sort of silent but dangerous examination.
Zach huffed but smiled. "so you're Townsend."
The two of them stared for a long time, wordless. It felt like I was watching a documentary on the Nature Channel, something about alpha males in the wild. — Ally Carter

You can't outdo 'Street Songs' and I didn't even try. [It] had that special magic that comes with timing and good vibrations and you can't even try to capture that exactly again. — Rick James

I think I'm misunderstood when I post these comments about films. So here is Kate Winslet [in Titanic] sitting on - you know, laying on this plank. This ship is down. She let her boyfriend drown. They didn't even try a second time to get him to float on that with her. So I'm angry by that, I think. — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

Love never lies and it never tries, it's unafraid and heaven made.

Keep the faith, surrender the time, just like a grape we need to ripen on the vine.

Be like a fairy, constantly glow, leave a trail of love wherever you go.

Do not try to make sense of this world. Do try to know yourself and to grow yourself while in it.

The more you are, the more you have.

Rather than make the best of a situation, make the best situation. Create, don't negate.

Keep the dream alive and the heart open.

Be your most glorious self, and even better, be indifferent to what anyone may think of it.

Don't fear the dark, it's helping you find the light. We wouldn't know morning, if we didn't see night.

Never give to say you've given, never shy away from a good cry, never stop a laugh from happening, and always wonder, why?

Don't get mad, get motivated! — Allyson Giles

My arms quickly grew too tired, and all the heat I'd gained from the shower left me. Giving up, I tossed the towel to the floor, crawled between the covers, and curled into a ball. I couldn't even rub my feet together to try to generate more heat. Clay walked in and turned off the lights. I listened to the familiar rustle of clothes. Instead of the usual bounce of him jumping up on the end of the bed, he peeled back the covers, and the bed dipped as he slid in next to me. I didn't bother to pretend I wasn't interested in what he offered. Heat radiated from him, chasing the chill from the sheets. "I really hope you're wearing shorts or something," I said with a slight slur. I stuck my cold feet right on his legs and shimmied over to his side to huddle against his warmth. Boy, was he warm. It didn't matter, though. The shaking didn't stop, but I was too exhausted to worry about it. Sighing, — Melissa Haag

I woke up in the hospital. Doctor Cunningham was bending over me. I thought, "We have to stop meeting like this," but didn't even try to say it out loud.
"You've lost blood and had your stitches redone. Do you think you can stay in here long enough for me
to actually release you this time?"
I think I smiled. "Yes, Doctor."
"Just in case you got any funny ideas about leaving, I've doped you up with enough pain killers to make you feel really good. So sleep, and I'll see you in the morning."
My eyes fluttered shut once, then opened. Edward was there. He bent over me and whispered, "Crawling through bushes on your belly, threatening to cut off a man's balls. Such a hard ass."
My voice came faintly even to me. "Had to save your ass."
He bent over me and kissed on my forehead. — Laurell K. Hamilton

Well, I'm sorry you couldn't make it either. I'm sorry I had to sit there in that church--which, by the way, had a broken air conditioner--sweating, watching all those people march down the aisle to look in my mother's casket and whisper to themselves all this mess about how much she looked like herself, even though she didn't. I'm sorry you weren't there to hear the lame choir drag out, song after song. I'm sorry you weren't there to see my dad try his best to be upbeat, cracking bad jokes in his speech, choking on his words. I'm sorry you weren't there to watch me totally lose it and explode into tears. I'm sorry you weren't there for me, but it doesn't matter, because even if you were, you wouldn't be able to feel what I feel. Nobody can. Even the preacher said so. — Jason Reynolds

Are you going to tell me how awesome that kiss was or are you going to ignore it?"
She shakes her head and laughs at me. "That wasn't even a real kiss," she says. "You didn't even try to put your tongue in my mouth."
... "I didn't have to put my tongue in your mouth," I say. "My kisses are that intense. I don't even really have to do anything. The only reason I pulled back was that I was sure we were about to experience a classic, 'When Harry met Sally' moment. — Colleen Hoover

Heal me? You're trying to heal me by rubbing your ... by rubbing against me?" Kat didn't even try to keep the skepticism out of her voice. "Yeah, right. — Evangeline Anderson

No offense, Jaron, but I don't want your life. Even locked away behind closed doors I got a taste for how awful it can be."
"Did anyone try to kill you while I was gone?"
"No."
"Then you didn't even get a taste. — Jennifer A. Nielsen

Good-bye,' I said to them, but they didn't seem to hear me, and why would they have wanted to? Why would they have wanted to do with the world outside of each other? Outside each other, they were mean little human beings like the rest of us, the kind of people you both loathed and pitied. Separately, they were characters, and not in a good way. But together they were something to wonder at and maybe even envy. I had this unoriginal thought as I walked out the door and toward my van: love changes us, makes us into people whom others then want to love. That's why, to those of us without it, love is the voice asking, What else? What else? And to those of us who have had love and lost it or thrown it away, then love is the voice that leads us back to love, to see if it might still be ours or if we've lost it, love is also the thing that makes us speak in aphorisms about love, which is why we try to get love back, so we can stop speaking that way. Aphoristically, that is. — Brock Clarke

Trace asked Jackson, "Why the hell are you even here?"
Jackson looked far too uneasy for Trace's peace of mind. "I know you didn't want me here. I got the message loud and clear when you cut the call. Thing is, your little lady was damned insistent that I do something."
"Like get stunned and tied up?"
"You try planning with a hellcat breathing fire in your ear, making demands, prodding you-"
"Priss?"
"She's a terror. That name doesn't suit her at all. — Lori Foster

I don't want to love you, Ellie, but I do love you. I can't stop myself. I've been try to since the moment I saw you with him. You broke me, you broke my fucking heart. You broke me into so many pieces that I didn't think I could find myself again. And I'm so damn scared, I'm scared just like you. You've always been my love, Ellie Watt, since the very beginning. Since the moment I saw your face, your beautiful, young face on that hot, dry day in Palm Valley. You were water for my soul, even in high school. You made me feel like I had another half, someone else who understood what it was like to be unwanted. — Karina Halle

You never got her last name, did you?" Kayden asks, covering his mouth with his hand to try and hide a laugh. The one that still breaks through and makes the urge to hit him even worse.
"It didn't seem important. You wanna clue me in?"
"Taylor. Cadence Taylor. Dumbass. — Melyssa Winchester

His father shook him roughly to get his attention. "Listen to me, boy. I need you to take care of your sisters. You hear me?" Even though he was the youngest of the Dagan children and only eight years old, it was something his dad always said to him. "Yeah, I know." "No, Cai, you don't. You're too young to comprehend what I'm trying to tell you, but you have to try." There was a sadness in his father's eyes that scared him. A resignation that had never been there before and it made him want to cry. But Dagans didn't cry and he wasn't about to let his dad see him act like one of his sisters. His father cupped his face in his calloused palm. "It'll be years before you understand what's happening - if even then. But I need you to listen to me and trust me. I won't be here to protect you anymore." Caillen — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Why shouldn't Mom trust me, Dad" Why are you so determined to make me out to be the bad guy all the time?" I stared at the side of his face, willing him to make eye contact. He didn't. "I've been doing really good late and you don't even care."
"Yet you still managed to get into trouble tonight," he said.
"You have no idea what happened tonight," I said, my voice ratcheting up a notch. "All you know is that, because I was involved, I'm somehow guilty of something. You could at least pretend to care, you know. You could at least try to understand."
Dad gave a sardonic little laugh. "I'll tell you what I understand," he said. "I understand that when you're left to your own devices you get into trouble, that's what I understand. I understand I was trying to have a happy, restful evening with Briley and once again you screwed it up. — Jennifer Brown

Anyway, here." He handed me a bag. "Thought you might be hungry. Since you're our guests, it would be impolite if we didn't share our food with you. That's your rations for the week. Try to make it last." At my surprised look, he rolled his eyes. "Not all of us live on oil and electricity, you know."
"What about Ash and Puck?"
"Well, I'm pretty sure eating our food won't melt their insides to gooey paste. But you never know." (Glitch)
Puck sat and gazed mournfully into the bowl I handed him. "Not an apple slice to be found," he sighed, picking through the gooey mess with his fingers. "How can mortals even pass this off as fruit? It's like a peach farmer threw up in a bowl."
Ash picked up the spoon, gazing at it like it was an alien life form. — Julie Kagawa

These people are civilians, Moira. Look at them. They didn't try to hurt Holcomb's workers and they're certainly no threat to the Cabal." I smiled and waved my right hand, palm out. "Come on. You know these aren't the druids you're looking for." No one even chuckled. So much for diffusing the situation with humor. — Mercedes Lackey

You can also see sometimes that the best pictures are the ones where you didn't try so hard, where you were just enjoying the process - and you didn't even know why you were making the picture. It felt right. If someone asked, 'Why are you making this picture?' you probably couldn't describe it very well - and that's why it needs to be a photograph. — John Sexton

Every Greek, man, woman, and child, has to two Greeks inside. We even have technical terms for them. They are a part of us, as inevitable as the fact that we all write poetry and the fact that every single one of us thinks that he knows everything that there is to know. We are all hospitable to strangers, we all are nostalgic for something, our mothers all treat their grown sons like babies, our sons all treat their mothers a sacred and beat their wives, we all hate solitude, we all try to find out from a stranger whether or not we are related, we all use every long word we know as often as we possibly can, we all go out for a walk in the evening so that we can look over each others' fences, we all think that we are equal to the best. Do you understand?"
The captain was perplexed, "You didn't tell me about the two Greeks inside every Greek."
"I didn't? Well, I must have wandered off the point. — Louis De Bernieres

If Feyre can't be bothered to listen to orders, then I can't be held accountable for the consequences."
"Accountable?" I sputtered, placing my hands flat on the table. "You cornered me in the hall like a wolf with a rabbit!"
Lucien propped an arm on the table and covered his mouth with has hand, his russet eye bright.
"While I might have been not myself, Lucien and I both told you to stay in your room," Tamlin said, so calmly that I wanted to rip out my hair.
I couldn't help it. Didn't even try to fight the red-hot temper that razed my senses. "Faerie pig!" I yelled, and Lucien howled, almost tipping back in his chair. At the sight of Tamlin's growing smile, I left. — Sarah J. Maas

Oh ye of little faith. Not for IYD ... But you didn't even try. — Karen Marie Moning

But life was sometimes unkind, and didn't give second chances. Instead it gave you two choices. You could either curl up and die, or get up and try again. Getting up takes huge amounts of effort. It means bearing down and pushing through the toughest of times, even if you have to create barriers around your heart, and grow an extra layer of skin. But it also gives you a strength you probably never knew you'd possessed. An ember begins to glow. The glow eventually sparks, breathing new flame, which fuels a hope and desire to live. — Cameo Renae

now, I still didn't have enough money to pay for all the repairs, and I had set out to fix the door on my own. I hadn't framed it very well, but I try to think positive: The new door was arguably even more secure than the old one - now you could barely get the damned thing open even when it wasn't locked. — Jim Butcher

I'm convinced that a lot of people simply don't know what's available out there and how it is possible to find a job and work your way up if you are willing to accept responsibility for your life. I know what it's like to be on the bottom. I've been broke. I've been fired seven times from jobs. And I don't even have a college degree. But I didn't blame anyone else for my problems. I knew that if I didn't try to solve them on my own or with the help of friends or family members, no one else was going to take care of me. — Rush Limbaugh

Not exactly what I wanted, but you know what they say about getting what you want."
"That you should want what you have instead?" I guessed.
"No! That's ridiculous advice. Jesus, who told you that? Never mind, don't even answer that. Just forget you ever heard it. They, and by 'they' I am referring to those who know what the hell they're talking about, say that you can't always get what you want. But if you try sometimes ... " He held out his hand for me to finish.
"You just might get what you need?"
He shucked me under the chin and gave me his best cocky smile. "There's hope for you yet."
He walked away from me with a determined swagger and didn't look back. — Liz Reinhardt

I went down on one knee in front of her. It was melodramatic, I know, but she was a teenager, and I thought she would probably buy it. "Samantha," I said. "All you have to do is just let me try. Do nothing, and I won't try to get you out of here against your will. You have my solemn word of honor." There was no crash of thunder, not even the sound of distant laughter, and in spite of my recent epidemic of unpleasant emotions, I felt no shame. And I believe I did it very convincingly. In fact, I think it was the performance of a lifetime - I didn't mean a word of it, of course, but under the circumstances I would gladly have promised her a ride on my flying saucer if it would get me out of here. And — Jeff Lindsay

Medusa was fascinating to work with because I gave her a snake's body so that she could pull herself with her hands which gave her a very creepy aura. I didn't want to animate cosmic gowns. Most Medusas you see in the classics have flowing robes which would be mad to even try to animate. — Ray Harryhausen

Just watch any husband arguing with his wife about something insignificant; listen to what they say and watch how their residual emotions manifest when the fight is over. It's so formulaic and unsurprising that you wouldn't dare re-create it in a movie. All the critics would mock it. They'd all say the screenwriter was a hack who didn't even try. This is why movies have less value than we like to pretend - movies can't show reality, because honest depictions of reality offend intelligent people. — Chuck Klosterman

Vexis listened, then shook her head, her eyes full of sorrow. 'YOU are the fool! You cannot rob people of their beliefs and expect them to just accept it. Even now, I mourn the death of Avanti every day. Even though I now know she was never real. The idea of Avanti was real. Serving Avanti gave me a purpose, I felt she was guiding and encouraging me. Now I have nothing, I am reduced to simply "making it up as I go along". I hate you Brael. I will never forgive you for what you did.'
Brael took a deep breath. 'You were always making it up as you went along. You just didn't know it. People need to take responsibility for their actions. There is one person guiding me, and that is me. I will live as long as I can and I will try to leave this world a better place for my presence. That is enough purpose for all. — Martyn Stanley

Finish want you started, Regret will hit you harder when you didn't even try to start. — Makram Shakur

Didn't matter how much love you gave them. How good you treated them. How you gave them everything you wish to the gods you'd had, including respect. It didn't matter how much you hated the life you'd been forced against your will to live or how hard you'd try to put the past behind you. They cursed you for surviving and judged you on a past you despised even more than they did. He and Nykyrian were the ones who'd lived in hell, and these assholes who had no understanding of the world dared to look down on them for it. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

After Kellan begged me for a final kiss, Griffin murmured, "Your wedding day is Thanksgiving. That's convenient." He pointed at Kellan. "You probably won't forget your anniversary." He looked over at Anna. "We shoulda done that. I already forgot ours."
Anna smirked at Griffin while Kellan's lip twitched. "Uh, it won't always be on Thanksgiving, Griff."
He looked horribly confused. "Huh? Yeah, it will."
"Kellan bit his lip. I could tell he was trying really hard not to laugh, since laughing hurt. "Thanksgiving isn't on the same day every year. It moves around."
Griffin glared at Kellan. "Don't even try fucking with me, Kell." He tapped his finger to his head. "I'm on to you."
I heard Matt and Evan snigger with Justin and Denny. My dad stared at the ceiling as he shook his head. I couldn't contain my giggle; poor Kellan had to take long, slow exhales so he didn't laugh with everyone else. "Griff, I'm not ... — S.C. Stephens

It's probably not going to lead to anything. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't try. If everyone who thought they might fail didn't even try, where would we be today? — Nicholas Sparks

And if you are a mom who has watched your child's father leave, my heart goes out to you. I also pray that you had no part in it. I pray that you didn't make it impossible for him while he was there. I pray that you didn't try and force him to live up to impossible expectations. And, I pray that if he is a good man and he wants to be there in his child's life that you love your child enough to let him. Even if that seems impossible to you. — Dan Pearce

God, could that dopey girl dance. Buddy Singer and his stinking band was playing 'Just One of Those Things' and even they couldn't ruin it entirely. It's a swell song. I didn't try any trick stuff while we danced
I hate a guy that does a lot of show-off tricky stuff on the dance floor
but I was moving her around plenty, and she stayed with me. The funny thing is, I thought she was enjoying it, too, till all of a sudden she came out with this very dumb remark. "I and my girl friends saw Peter Lorre last night," she said. "The movie actor. In person. He was buyin' a newspaper. He's cute."
"You're lucky," I told her. "You're really lucky. You know that?" She was really a moron. But what a dancer. — J.D. Salinger

Drew backed to the door. Even her closest lieutenants didn't follow her. She was about to leave when Piper said, "Oh, and Drew, honey?" The former counselor looked back reluctantly. "In case you think I'm not a true daughter of Aphrodite," Piper said, "don't even look at Jason Grace. He may not know it yet, but he's mine. If you even try to make a move, I will load you into a catapult and shoot you across Long Island Sound." Drew turned around so fast, she ran into the doorframe. — Rick Riordan

I was in the car with Trace and heard his side of the conversation with you. Sounded clear enough to me."
"Apparently not, cuz I'm not sweet on her. What kind of dumb-ass thing is that to say? I like her, sure, even though she's not the easiest lady to be around."
"No?"
Jackson didn't seem to hear her. He continued on as he pulled food from the tiny fridge and piled it on the counter. "She has her reasons for being prickly, and I know it."
"Those reasons are?"
"And there isn't a man alive who wouldn't want her. She's about the sexiest thing I've ever seen." He shook his head. "But I'm not sweet> about anything." He scoffed. "That sounds like some adolescent bullshit or something."
"You have a very limited vocabulary."
"My balls still hurt. It's affecting my brain."
"Your brain is located a little low, isn't it?"
He paused, then laughed. Shaking a loaf of bread at her, he said, "Good one. I'll have to try to remember this sharp wit of yours. — Lori Foster

I am inspired by thinkers. I am inspired by rebellion. I am inspired by children. I have been inspired by love. I have been inspired by heartbreak. I try to take everything that comes at me in life. There have been times in my life that I didn't handle things ... right. But even though you stumble, you still kind of get through it. — Nikki Sixx

I can't today," I said. "Maybe tomorrow?"
"Can't tomorrow," said Quinn. "I have a family thing. I guess we're logistically star-crossed, Juliet."
Sometimes Quinn calls me Juliet because of how we had to do that scene together, and whenever he does it's good for another bout of brain paralysis. So all I could manage back was "Oh."
"But I'll talk to you later, okay?" he said.
I didn't even try to say anything else but just nodded, wondering as I did what would happen next. The steps had largely emptied by then.
But before I could do much wondering, Quinn's lips were on mine.
And this time it definitely counted. — Jennifer Sturman

So, I know what the ladies like," Dad said. "I used to be a bad boy myself."

Kami raised her eyebrows. "Oh, you were?"

"I won't go into it, because I know you honor and respect me as your parent, and I don't want to spoil your illusions," said Dad. "Also I don't want to give you any ideas. Let's just say there were fires."

"Dad! You set fires?"

"Fires happened," said Dad. "And then there was your mother. She had no time for any of that. She didn't try to reform me. She wasn't allured by my wiles."

"You had wiles?" Kami inquired, with even more disbelief than she'd shown regarding the fires.

"Damn good wiles," said Dad. "And I was smoother than that sullen blond kid too. Way smoother." There was a glint in his eye.

"You were saying about Mum?" Kami asked hastily. — Sarah Rees Brennan

He took a deep breath. "You make me question myself," he said. "All the time, every day. I was brought up to believe I had to be perfect. A perfect warrior, a perfect son. Even when I came to live with the Lightwoods, I thought I had to be perfect, because otherwise they would send me away. I didn't think love came with forgiveness. And then you came along, and you broke everything I believed into pieces, and I started to see everything differently. You had - so much love, and so much forgiveness, and so much faith. So I started to think that maybe I was worth that faith. That I didn't have to be perfect; I had to try, and that was good enough." He lowered his eyelids; she could see the faint pulse at his temple, feel the tension in him. "So I think you were the wrong person for the Jace that I was, but not the Jace that I am now, the Jace you helped make me. Who is, incidentally, a Jace I like much better than the old one. You've changed me for the better. — Cassandra Clare

Everything I told him was technically true, more or less, and I got the job done," Jack said stubbornly. "Look, sir, if I were perfect, I wouldn't be working here in the first place. Now, would I?"
And then he hung up. On speakerphone. On a freaking archangel.
I couldn't help it. I let out a rolling belly laugh. "I just got suckered into doing this by ... Stars and stones, you didn't even know that he ... Big bad angel boy, and you get the wool pulled over your eyes by ... " I stopped trying to talk and just laughed.
Uriel eyed the phone, then me, and then tucked the little device away again, clearly nonplussed. "It doesn't matter how well I believe I know your kind, Harry. They always manage to find some way to try my patience. — Jim Butcher

I've been lucky between 'Buffy,' 'Angel,' 'Alias,' and then 'Lost.' The thing they all have in common is that they were all fearless. They were not afraid to be different and try something different. Even if you didn't know that it was going to work, just try to do something new and fresh. — Drew Goddard

When did you guys even start speaking again?"
Ernie shrugged and popped a peanut into his mouth. "He's probably just sniffing around here so I leave him my property when I kick it." He drank his beer and leaned back into his easy chair. "Eh, he's a good kid. My sister's only son. He's family. Family's family. Never forget that, Conrad."
"Ernie, two commercial breaks ago, you told me that if I didn't try and break up my brother's wedding, I was a punk!"
Picking at his teeth, Ernie said, "If a girl's the one, all bets are off, family or no family. — Jenny Han

When you wrote it didn't matter if hysteria sometimes came up in your face and voice (unless, of course, you let it find its way into your "literary voice") because writing was done in merciful privacy and silence. Even if you were partly out of your mind it might turn out to be all right: you could try for control even harder than Blanche Dubois was said to have tried, and with luck you could still bring off a sense of order and sanity on the page for the reader. Reading, after all, was a thing done in privacy and silence too. — Richard Yates

Damn, Josie. Are you trying to kill me?"
She glanced back my way. "Not particularly right now. Why?"
I didn't even try to stop staring. It would have been a wasted effort. "Because that dress is enough to give a man a heart attack if you come any closer, or break a man's heart if you walk away."
"Now lines like that help me understand why you've got a reputation for being such a ladies man."
"That wasn't even my best one."
( ... )
That kind of dress could bring a man to his knee to propose, even if that had been the furthest thing from his mind when he woke up that morning. Hell, it was bringing me close to a proposal, and I was dead set against anything marriage related. — Nicole Williams

I won't even try to pretend to know what bugs think about during sex, but right about the time the male praying mantis is probably thinking that he's quite the stud, the female does something pretty surprising. Yes, even for horny, bat-shit-crazy, homicidal copulating bugs. Once she has had enough of copulating, she moves on to the next phase, which is masticating. No, not masturbating ... masticating. This is a fancy-schmancy word for chewing. She chews his head off. And no, I don't mean like, "Why didn't you bring me flowers and chocolate?" Oh, no. She literally bites his head off ... and here's where it gets really interesting: She eats it. — Michael Makai

I think she and I were talking about how much I adored skateboarding on the computer but how it would never even occur to me to try and step on a skateboard in real life, and then she said, 'Let's play Truth or Dare' and then you fucked her."
"Wait, you fucked her? In front of the Colonel?" Takumi cried.
"I didn't fuck her. — John Green

I always see to the dogs first and leave the cats and the occasional birds and rabbits and hamsters for later. It isn't that I play favorites, it's just that dogs are needier than other pets. Leave a dog alone for very long and it'll start going a little nuts. Cats, on the other hand, try to give you the impression that they didn't even notice you were gone. Oh, were you out? they'll say, I didn't notice. Then they'll raise their tails to show you their little puckered anuses and walk away. — Blaize Clement

We'd already talked in the stacks, and I knew you were different from any other girl I'd met. And you told me that your parents were dead, and I thought that you were so ... lost and vulnerable. So when I saw you in the physics lab ... and I saw you try and take care of someone that you thought who had been through what you'd been through; could be that ... well, generous, and thoughtfull ... " Guy said.
"But you hardly knew me." said Willow
"I know ... I didn't know that we'd even talk again, or that if we did, if we'd get along, or maybe you were seeing someone else ... I just knew that the way you tried to protect someone's life that, especially given your situation ... I just ... I though that you had to be the most special girl I would ever meet ... — Julia Hoban

This is what I hate most about guys like you. You didn't even try. — Henry V. O'Neil

I am writing to you because she said you listen and understand and didn't try to sleep with that person at that party even though you could have. — Stephen Chbosky

I think it's just a gash. Hurts like bloody hell, though. Remind me ... to never try to rescue you again."
"I can't believe the timing, that you stepped in just when I was thrusting. I didn't see you."
"I didn't see the knife, so we're even. — Lorraine Heath

I don't want to make a big deal about this or anything, but I think it's kind of cool how you do everything you do."
I squinted at him.
"I mean, you use sign language, and it's hard to communicate. But you're into art and you can seriously cook and, for goodness' sakes, you can even jitterbug. By the way, I told my mom, and she wants a video. Totally doesn't believe me. But, yeah, I think it's nice that you don't let a little hitch in life slow you down. I admire that."
I smiled. For a minute, I admired myself, too. He didn't know how deep my problems ran, but he was right all the same. It was no small thing to try, to find out what you cared about in life. Even this moment, with this wonderful, temporary boy beside me, was a tiny miracle. I ought to give myself some credit. — Kiera Cass

Run! my brain screamed, but my feet didn't move. Seriously. No movement at all, just like in one of those dreams where a giant dinosaur suddenly appears in the grocery store parking lot and you can't seem to start running away or even throw a package of chicken thighs to create a diversion, no matter how hard you try. — Joanna Wylde

Be honest: Are you surprised that I didn't realize sooner? Are you surprised that it took me so long to even /think/ the word
death? Dying? Dead?
Do you think I was being stupid? Naive?
Try not to judge. Remember that we're the same, you and me.
I thought I would live forever too. — Lauren Oliver

Without even thinking about it, I sent Callum an image of a dog hiking his leg at a fire hydrant. And then one of a rebel flag from the Revolutionary War.
Callum didn't respond in my head, but I knew he'd gotten the message, because he met me at the front door, and the first thing he said, with a single arch of his eyebrow, was, "Don't tread on you?"
"More like 'don't metaphorically pee on my brainwaves,' but it's the same sentiment, really."
"Vulgarity does not become you, Bryn."
"Are you going to lecture, or are we going to run?"
He sighed, but I didn't need a bond with the pack to see that he was thinking that I had always, always been a difficult child. And then, just in case that point wasn't clear, he verbalized it. "You have always, always been a difficult child."
I smiled sweetly. "I try. — Jennifer Lynn Barnes

There's an arrest warrant out for her. Did you even consider taking her to the Commander?"
"No."
"Why not?" Valek didn't try to hide his disbelief. "Killing isn't the only solution to a problem. Or has that been yourformula?"
" My formula! Excuse me, Mr. Assassin, while I laugh as I remember my history lessons on how to deal with a tyrannical monarch by killing him and his family."
Valek flashed me a dangerous look. — Maria V. Snyder

With Derrida, you can hardly misread him, because he's so obscure. Every time you say, "He says so and so," he always says, "You misunderstood me." But if you try to figure out the correct interpretation, then that's not so easy. I once said this to Michel Foucault, who was more hostile to Derrida even than I am, and Foucault said that Derrida practiced the method of obscurantisme terroriste (terrorism of obscurantism). We were speaking French. And I said, "What the hell do you mean by that?" And he said, "He writes so obscurely you can't tell what he's saying, that's the obscurantism part, and then when you criticize him, he can always say, 'You didn't understand me; you're an idiot.' That's the terrorism part." And I like that. So I wrote an article about Derrida. I asked Michel if it was OK if I quoted that passage, and he said yes. — John Rogers Searle

I don't even have a choice. Rachel thought how that was pretty much true of everything now, that you got one choice at the beginning but if you didn't choose right, and she hadn't, things got narrow real quick. Like trying to wade a river, she thought. You take a wrong step and set your foot on a wobbly rock or in a drop-off and you're swept away, and all you can do then is try to survive. (83) — Ron Rash

There will be others, many others. You'll try desperately to digest a single word through the acronym-laden gibberish, while beginning to wonder what the point of all this is, and also why you didn't feel that staple you just sent into your thigh. You usually do. You'll wonder what your company even does. After six years, you have no idea what an information system is, do you? Maybe you should ask. Maybe that's how this ends. You'll imagine how poetic it would be to simply unmute yourself and say, "Sorry to interrupt, guys, but what's an information system?"
Still, your mind will drift further, envisioning how much more tolerable this call would be if you could just slowly masturbate during it. So you do. You masturbate during it. And it's beautiful. Masturbating, invisible within your three-walled fortress. Invisible ... invisible ... practically invisible. — Colin Nissan

If I didn't fear I'd do you harm...I'd try to make you an atheist. I really do think that you are a deluded follower of mistaken and superstitious and cowardly theories. That's as far as I'll go....Everyone who worships a god worships a force back of all nature, no matter what they call him or it and even if they call his aspects by different names & have many "gods." If there really is such a force, then all people who worship any god or gods, worship the same god. I'd just as soon call him Ishtar or Baal or Jehovah. They're merely names for the same idea. (Letter from Simpson to Anne Roe, written ca. 1920-21, when Anne was briefly flirting with fundamentalist Christianity, American Philosophical Society archives.) — George Gaylord Simpson

Really?" [Catarina] said when he opened the door. " Two years and then you come back and don't even call for two weeks? And then it's 'Come over, I need you'? You didn't even tell me you were home, Magnus."
"I'm home", he said, giving what he considered to be his most winning smile. The smiling took a bit of effort, but hopefully it looked genuine.
"Don't even try that face with me. I am not one of your conquests, Magnus. I am your friend. We are supposed to get pizza, not do the nasty."
"The nasty? But I-"
"Don't." She held up a warning finger. "I mean it. I almost didn't come. But you sounded so pathetic on the phone I had to. — Cassandra Clare

Nothing could be taken for granted. Women who loved you tried to cut your throat, while women who didn't even know your name scrubbed your back. Witches could sound like Katharine Hepburn and your best friend could try to strangle you. Smack in the middle of an orchid there might be a blob of jello and inside a Mickey Mouse doll, a fixed and radiant star. — Toni Morrison

He didn't say a word and she didn't ask anything else, just ran her fingers through his hair until his breathing began to calm. Without letting go of her or even pulling away to face her he finally whispered against her ear, "Please don't leave me. I promise I'll try harder." Slowly he pulled away and their eyes met. "I'm nothing without you, Izzy. — Elizabeth Reyes

It didn't seem like they were here to find food. Nor did they have the patience to bite anyone. Left to themselves, they'd quickly haul to particles of mud and built nests here and there in the house. You could try scuttling them with a broom, but they'd get into a mad frenzy and climb up the broom and on to your arm. Before you knew it, they'd be all over you, even under your clothes. For days on end there would be a terrific invasion, and then one day you would wake up to find them gone. There was no telling why they came, where they went. I sometimes saw them racing in lines along the window sills in the front room, where there was nothing to eat. Perhaps they were on a mission of some sort, only passing through our house in self-important columns. But not once did I see the trail of a column, an ant that had no other ants behind it. — Vivek Shanbhag

It's different," you said. "You've made, Min, everything different for me. Everything's like coffee you made me try, better than I ever - or the places I didn't even know were right on the street, you know? I'm like this thing I saw when I was little, where a kid hears a noise under his bed and there's a ladder there that's never been there before, and he climbs down and, it's for kids I know, but this song starts playing ... " Your eyes were traveling in the treey light. — Daniel Handler

You didn't answer my question. I asked you about being in love. You said what it was like when your wife went away."
Martin sat down again. How young she is. When we were that young we invented the world, no one could tell us a thing. Julia stood with her hands clenched, as though she wanted to pound an answer out of him. "Being in love is ... anxious," he said. "Wanting to please, worrying that she will see me as I really am. But wanting to be known. That is ... you're naked, moaning in the dark, no dignity at all ... I wanted her to see me and to love me even though she knew everything I am, and I knew her. Now she's gone, and my knowledge is incomplete. So all day I imagine what she is doing, what she says and who she talks to, how she looks. I try to supply the missing hours, and it gets harder as they pile up, all the time she's been gone. I have to imagine. I don't know, really. I don't know any more. — Audrey Niffenegger

There is a distinction between failing and being a failure. Few things are learned in life without failing at least once. Did you learn to roller skate without falling a few times? Did you learn to ride a bike without losing your balance? Chances are you didn't. You may have wanted to do those things so intensely that you quickly put unsuccessful attempts behind you and kept trying. Soon you acquired the skill to do the thing you wanted. Even though in the process of learning you may have failed many times, you were not a failure. "Failing" simply became an open door to try again. — John Templeton

Wow. See? You can't say that's not impressive." I recognize the names, even if I don't know what they all did.
"I didn't." He reaches for his wallet and pays our admission charge. I try to get it - since it was my idea in the first place - but he insists. "Happy Thanksgiving," he says, handing me my ticket. "Let's see some dead people." We're greeted by an unimaginable number of domes and columns and arches. Everything is huge and round. — Stephanie Perkins

If you hadn't been jealous of Ayden and thrown me in your car, Eros would never have had to come to my rescue which started this whole fiasco." "Don't try to pin this on me!"
"The lonely lone wolf didn't deny he loved Aurora." Blake chuckled and dodged out of the Aussie's swack.
"Ugh." Ayden walked beside me and put a hand around my waist.
"Now I have to compete for your affection with both Blake and Matthias."
I rolled a dramatic shrug. "I tried to put him down easy, but he's so infatuated. It's embarrassing. Even with all those other girls after him."
"I can't bloody stand you!" Blake sighed. "Me thinks he doth confess too much."
A & E Kirk (2014-05-26). Drop Dead Demons: The Divinicus Nex Chronicles: Book 2 (Divinicus Nex Chronicles series) (p. 565). A&E Kirk. Kindle Edition. — A&E Kirk

(It starts with)
One thing, I don't know why
It doesn't even matter how hard you try
Keep that in mind, I designed this rhyme
To explain in due time
All I know
time is a valuable thing
Watch it fly by as the pendulum swings
Watch it count down to the end of the day
The clock ticks life away
It's so unreal
Didn't look out below
Watch the time go right out the window
Trying to hold on but didn't even know
Wasted it all just to
Watch you go
I kept everything inside and even though I tried, it all fell apart
What it meant to me will eventually be a memory of a time when I tried so hard
And got so far
But in the end
It doesn't even matter
I had to fall
To lose it all
But in the end
It doesn't even matter — Linkin Park

The trick to negotiation was to hold all the cards going in and, even if you didn't, to try to look as though you did. — Eoin Colfer

What, you didn't pack your lunch?" Ty asked sarcastically as he
shifted around in the seat and wedged himself against the door. He kicked a
foot up and propped it on the console between the two front seats.
"Sure, in my SpongeBob SquarePants lunch box. I have the thermos,
too," Morrison shot right back.
Zane kept his mouth shut, eyes moving between the two men, and
occasionally back to the driver, who was casually paying attention.
Ty stared at the kid and narrowed his eyes further. "Spongewhat?" he
asked flatly.
Zane didn't even try to hold back the chuckle when Morrison looked
at Ty like he'd lost his mind.
"Spongewha ... you're yanking my chain, aren't you?" Morrison
said. "Henny, he's yanking my chain."
"Yeah, well, that's what you getting for waving it in his face," the
driver answered reasonably.
"What the hell is a SpongeBob?" Ty asked Zane quietly in the
backseat. — Madeleine Urban

What are you two up to today?"
"Oh, I just figured I'd show Ty some more of Texas. Head down to San Antonio and visit the Bureau office there," Zane said. He shot a sideways look at Ty. "Maybe spend the night in Beaumont."
Ty smacked his forehead and turned his head away.
"Not much in Beaumont to see," Harrison said with a frown.
Zane grinned. "Even so, we're going to try to get it in." Ty had his hand over his mouth, his head down. He was either going to throw up or he was laughing. Harrison felt he'd missed a joke, but he thought maybe he didn't want to know. — Abigail Roux

The surface of the pond was green with fallen leaves. "How could you have been happy there? I know what you thought, but Valentine was a terrible father. He killed your pets, lied to you, and I know he hit you- don't even try to pretend he didn't."
A flicker of a smile ghosted across Jace's face. "Only on alternate Thursdays. — Cassandra Clare