Tiptoed Quotes

The label of 'marathoner' has, from the beginning, been awarded to those who went the distance under their own power, whether they ran, walked, crawled or tiptoed. When you cross that finish line, you've entered an elite group. About one-tenth of one percent of the population has done it. Don't let anyone take that great achievement away from you. ~ Jeff Galloway

Helena silently put down the phone and tiptoed to the bathroom door. What should she do? Run? Knock? Walk in? Get naked? And ... how should she feel? Excited? Freaked out? Angry because he hadn't called for three weeks? Relieved, because the wait was over and she could finally start asking all those questions swimming in her head? The door swung open, and Niccolo boldly stood before her in his birthday-suit-glory, his unforgettable diamond-cut abs glistening with drops of water. A whoosh of air left her lungs. I'm going with ... naked and excited! ~ Mimi Jean Pamfiloff

It's okay, Harley. I'm just down the hall." He didn't say anything but I could tell he was afraid. I closed the door gently behind me and tiptoed down the hall. I stood in the kitchen, my heart pounding. I was listening for his cry, but there was not sound at all. I went back into the hall. Harley had got out of bed and put his hands under the door. His fingers were coming out from underneath. They were blue and luminous, like starfish. When I opened the door - I was careful not to scrape the skin off the back of his hands - he looked up from where he lay on the floor with saucer eyes and implored me, "I want to sleep with you." I put out my arms and he climbed into them. I carried him down the hall, in his singlet and his Kermit underpants. I put Harley down in the middle of our mattress. He curled like a kitten into the hollow. ~ Caroline Overington

Lucas crept around the building to the back parking lot. And there it was, just like he had seen from the roof - a baby lying in a shopping cart. Lucas's mind went negative. What if the kid was dead? He tried to think if he had ever seen a dead person before. He'd never been to a funeral, and he knew he had never seen a dead baby. And he definitely didn't want to.
His heart pounded in his chest.
Lucas walked, almost tiptoed, toward the shopping cart. The last of the parking lot lights flickered out, leav-ing only the early morning sun. He moved across the blacktop, making sure not to step on a white line. At this moment he needed all the luck he could muster. As he got closer to the cart, he held his breath and swallowed. Then he grabbed the shopping cart handle and looked over into the basket.
He gasped. ~ Paul Aertker

They inched through dense, heart-stopping darkness. In the distance was what looked like a bright white door cut out of a black wall. Sunni tiptoed towards it, puzzled by its brilliance. ~ Teresa Flavin

Tying the laces. The bottom line was that Grandpa would have been willing to risk his life on the gamble that the shadows of Tanu and Coulter meant to offer meaningful assistance. He would have followed them if he could have done so alone. He simply was not willing to risk Seth's life. To Seth, this proved that the risk was worth taking. If Grandpa loved him too much to let him take a worthwhile risk, then he would bypass Grandpa. Shoes secure, Seth slid his emergency kit out from under the bed. Then he tiptoed down the attic stairs, flinching at every creak. At the bottom of the steps the house remained dark and quiet. Seth hurried along the hall and down the stairs to the entry hall. He stole into Grandpa's study, tugged a chain to turn on a desk lamp, and rummaged through Tanu's bag of potions. After examining several bottles, Seth found the one he wanted, grabbed it, and closed the bag. ~ Brandon Mull

I was in bed at my beach house, but could not sleep because of some fried chicken in the icebox that I felt entitled to. I waited till my wife dropped off, and tiptoed into the kitchen. I remembered looking at the clock. It was precisely four-fifteen. I'm quite certain of this, because our kitchen clock has not worked in twenty-one years and is always at that time. I also noticed that our dog, Judas, was acting funny. He was sanding up on his hind legs and singing, 'I Enjoy Being a Girl.' Suddenly the room turned bright orange. At first, I thought my wife had caught me eating between meals and set fire to the house. Then I looked out the window, where to my amazement I saw a gigantic cigar-shaped aircraft hovering just over the treetops in the yard and emitting an orange glow. I stood transfixed for what must have been several hours, though our clock still read four-fifteen, so it was difficult to tell. Finally, a large, mechanical claw extended from the aircraft and snatched the two pieces of chicken from my hand and quickly retreated. When I reported the incident to the Air Force, they told me that what I had seen was a flock of birds. When I protested, Colonel Quincy Bascomb personally promised that the Air Force would return the two pieces of chicken. To this day, I have only received one piece. ~ Woody Allen

Alarmed and bordering on terrified, Frankie reached for the closest thing she could find that might work as a weapon – which in Louise's house was a curling iron – and tiptoed downstairs to confront the intruder - Chapter One ~ Kerri Thomson

She tiptoed her fingers along his back. "Were you really making love to me?"
He rolled back over onto her. "If you have to ask, then I'm obviously not doing it well enough. Let me try a bit more diligently before I go searching for a dragon. ~ Lorraine Heath

Nature's a funny old thing, it does whatever it pleases. He had always been a little afraid of it. He tiptoed into forests, speaking in a whisper, as though entering a church. Nature was mysterious, incomprehensible, impenetrable, off limits, like the ladies' toilets. ~ Pascal Garnier

Some time in the night I got up, tiptoed to my window, and looked out at my doghouse. It looked so lonely and empty sitting there in the moonlight. I could see that the door was slightly ajar. I thought of the many times I had lain in my bed and listened to the squeaking of the door as my dogs went in and out. I didn't know I was crying until I felt the tears roll down my cheeks. ~ Wilson Rawls

I wrapped myself in the flimsy hospital gown and tiptoed across the hospital room to sit down on the hospital bed, holding my arms across my chest, trying to contain my breasts. They seemed enormous and unpredictable without a bra. ~ Jessica Knoll

Sunday morning dawned bright and cloudless. Ernest awoke early as always. He put on the red "Emporor's robe" and padded softly down the carpeted stairway. The early sunlight lay in pools on the living room floor. He had noticed that the guns were locked up in the basement. But the keys, as he well knew, were on the window ledge above the kitchen sink. He tiptoed down the basement stairs and unlocked the storage room. It smelled as dank as a grave. He chose a double-barreled Boss shotgun with a tight choke. He had used it for years of pigeon shooting. He took some shells from one of the boxes in the storage room, closed and locked the door, and climbed the basement stairs. If he saw the bright day outside, it did not deter him. He crossed the living room to the front foyer, a shrinelike entryway five by seven feet, with oak-paneled walls and a floor of linoleum tile. He had held for years to the maxim: "il faut (d'abord) durer". Now it had been succeeded by another: "il faut (apres tout) mourir". The idea, if not the phrase, filled all his mind. He slipped in two shells, lowered the gun butt carefully to the floor, leaned forward, pressed the twin barrels against his forehead just above the eyebrows, and tripped both triggers. ~ Carlos Baker

Lily Donaldson tiptoed to the front door and winced when it opened with a creak. ~ Colleen Coble

How very softly you tiptoed into our world, almost silently, only a moment you stayed. But what an imprint your footsteps have left upon our hearts ~ Dorothy Ferguson

We had once what we can never have again. So why, then, do we behave as if everything we have connected with, everything we have blessed with our loving, should be ours for keeps? It is enough to have tiptoed to that space beyond the skin, beyond our nerve endings, and to have glimpsed things that beforehand we only half knew. ~ Rachel Joyce

I haven't always been a writer and I suppose I tiptoed around the idea of writing full time, because it's so isolating. ~ Marisha Pessl

Do you think we're being robbed?" I whispered.
He nodded gravely, then crawled over to my closet and opened it.
"Did you want to borrow something more formal to wear for the robbery? I'm not sure I have anything in your size."
"Shh," he whispered. "Don't you at least have a tennis racket or anything?"
"You think they came here looking for a doubles partner?"
He turned quickly and gave me a look, then whipped a Wiffle bat out of the mess.
"Wow," I said. "You jock-type people really are single-minded, aren't you? Uh-oh, we're being robbed. Let's play ball!"
"It's for a weapon," Carson whispered.
"You're gonna hit them with a Wiffle bat?"
"What else you got?"
"Um...A pillow"
"Exactly" ... "Stay behind me," he whispered.
"Can I just say that I never knew this about me before, but weirdly enough this whole protective he-man thing actually turns me on."
"Josie."
"What," I asked.
"Shut Up."
I grabbed my pillow, just in case, so to speak, and tiptoed behind him around the mussed-up bed. "Maybe we should just hide in the closet."
He turned around, rolled his eyes and kissed me. "Shh," he repeated. ~ Rachel Vail

She closed her eyes; and in the sweet slumber lying
her spirit tiptoed from its lodging place.
It's folly to shrink in fear, if this is dying;
for death looked lovely in her face. ~ Francesco Petrarca

I'm a fucking adult. I can eat a cookie before dinner if I want to." Sure, keep telling yourself that. Knowing if his mother had been alive, she would have scolded him, he tiptoed to the airtight container and took out one cookie. Come on, one little frosted cookie wouldn't hurt. He hesitated, and then he grabbed a second cookie in case the first didn't take the edge off. He bit down into the sugary goodness and groaned. Hell, yeah, this is better than sex. He choked on the last bit of cookie and grabbed his beer to wash it down. Fuck, he needed to get laid if a cookie was better than sex. How long had it been? ~ Carrie Ann Ryan

couple of small suites, all nicely furnished. There was a small sitting area with a gas fireplace, lush carpeting and deep leather chairs. She tiptoed in, enjoying ~ Ana Meadows

I have always been paranoid about waking people up. When I was younger and would come home late, I would take about twenty minutes to get from the driveway into my bed. I tiptoed up the walk, slid my house key in the door very slowly, took my shoes off outside, and crept upstairs to the bathroom like a burglar. Often I wouldn't even flush until morning, preferring to let my business simmer overnight rather than wake somebody up with the sound of it zooming through walls on its way out of the house. ~ Neil Pasricha

If I tell you that Mrs. Robbins had bad teeth and looked like a horse, you will laugh at me as a cliché-monger; yet it is the truth. I can do nothing with the teeth; but let me tell you that she looked like a French horse, a dark, Mediterranean, market-type horse that has all its life begrudged to the poor the adhesive-tape on a torn five-franc note - that has tiptoed (to save its shoes) for centuries along that razor-edge where Greed and Caution meet. ~ Randall Jarrell

It had been two weeks since they had last danced, and Azalea lay in bed, awake again. A dream hadn't roused her this time, but rather an odd tinny noise that had been clinking across the wooden floor of their room, under their beds and butting against the wainscot with a clinkety tap-tap. It sounded like ... well, quite honestly, it sounded like a spider dragging a spoon.

Azalea knew it couldn't possibly be that (or, rather, she hoped it wasn't), but even so, she heaved herself from the bed and grasped one of Hollyhock's boots, strewn across the floor. The tapping now clinked from the fireplace, and Azalea caught a glint of silver among the soot. Raising the boot, she tiptoed to the unlit hearth.

The fireplace in their room was massive - so large that Azalea could stand up in it and her skirts wouldn't brush the sides. The silver hopped. Azalea dove.

In a puff of soot, Azalea found herself sitting in the hearth, and the silver bit skittering away like mad. Azalea grabbed at it and was rewarded with a very sharp, very familiar bite.

"You!" Azalea seethed, leaping up. Now she recognized the half-hopping half-skitter motion. The sugar teeth! ~ Heather Dixon Wallwork

One night, unable to sleep, I tiptoed into the hallway and overheard my grandfather telling a table of acquaintances about the expensive Armenian cognac with which he had once plied the surgeon who was going to remove my grandmother's gallbladder the next morning. They drank so much tat the surgeon was still drunk when he picked up the scalpel. The table roared, though my grandmother did not. ~ Boris Fishman

So the Scouts went to work
setting up camp--
raising the tent,

filling the lamp,

building the fire,
getting it lit.

Jane took time
to explore a bit.

She collected some leaves.
She studied some seeds.
That's when she heard
a voice in the weeds.

Chuckling and talking
to himself in there
was--you guessed it--
Papa Q. Bear!

"This trick will be fun,"
Papa Bear said
as he pulled the sheet
over his head.

"Hmm," said Jane
as she tiptoed away.
"This is a game
that two can play!"

Then using twigs
and leaves as a base,
she started to make
what looked like…

A FACE! ~ Stan Berenstain

Can I come look?"
He sat back on his heels and gestured to his artwork. "By all means. I'm done."
I got up, happily noting that my ankle was now pain free. I carefully tiptoed around the two square feet of floor over which his drawing sprawled, and settled in next to him. "It's beautiful," I told him. "I'm flattered. I've never had anyone draw a picture of me before."
Sage cocked his head and studied what he'd etched. "You think it looks like you?"
Again a hot crawl of embarrassment raced up my neck and flooded my face. I looked more closely at the etching. The image did look like me, but only if you really wanted to see the resemblance. The woman in it had the same hair, and slept in the same position I had, but on closer inspection her features were quite different. Her eyes were farther apart, her nose more pointed, her cheekbones less defined…differences that seemed insignificant when I'd assumed the picture was of me, but knowing it wasn't…
I was an egocentric idiot. My dreams about this man may have been vivid, but they were dreams. They had nothing to do with reality; not mine, and clearly not his. I stammered, groping for some kind of explanation. I had nothing.
"She does look like you, a little," Sage admitted. His eyes lingered on the contours of the drawing's face. I was eager to change the subject, but I felt like I had to ask.
"Who is she?"
"Someone I loved a long time ago," he murmured. ~ Hilary Duff

With a deep regret, I wiggled out from under him despite his sleepy protests and grabbed articles of clothing as I tiptoed to his door. What amazing willpower I had. What fantastic self-control. I'd come over for one reason, and everything but that reason seemed to be resolved. When I reached the door, I saw what looked like another note. But this was his door, not mine. I peeled it off, then angled it until I could read it by the light of the fire.
Is that all you've got?
With a smile spreading slowly across my face, I dropped everything I'd just picked up and went back for more. ~ Darynda Jones

Stay in the boat, I told myself, watching them walk up to the pavilion. I'll just stay in the boat. I won't go anywhere near that creature.
But in spite of that wise warning, I climbed out of the boat.
Fine, stretch your legs, I told myself. Just don't follow them.
But of course, I followed them.
You are without question your own worst enemy, I scolded myself, even as I tiptoed after them. ~ Merrie Haskell

The End of the Raven
On a night quite unenchanting, when the rain was downward slanting
I awakened to the ranting of the man I catch mice for.
Tipsy and a bit unshaven, in a tone I found quite craven,
Poe was talking to a Raven perched above the chamber door.
'Raven's very tasty,' thought I, as I tiptoed o'er the floor.
'There is nothing I like more.'
[ ... ]
Still the Raven never fluttered, standing stock-still as he uttered
In a voice that shrieked and sputtered, his two cents' worth
'Nevermore.'
While this dirge the birdbrain kept up, oh, so silently I crept up,
Then I crouched and quickly leapt up, pouncing on the feathered bore.
Soon he was a heap of plumage, and a little blood and gore
Only this and not much more. ~ Henry N. Beard

So while dueling may have begun as a response to high crimes - to treachery, treason, and adultery - by 1900 it had tiptoed down the stairs of reason, until they were being fought over the tilt of a hat, the duration of a glance, or the placement of a comma. In ~ Amor Towles

Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note

Lately, I've become accustomed to the way
The ground opens up and envelopes me
Each time I go out to walk the dog.
Or the broad edged silly music the wind
Makes when I run for a bus...

Things have come to that.

And now, each night I count the stars.
And each night I get the same number.
And when they will not come to be counted,
I count the holes they leave.

Nobody sings anymore.

And then last night I tiptoed up
To my daughter's room and heard her
Talking to someone, and when I opened
The door, there was no one there...
Only she on her knees, peeking into

Her own clasped hands ~ LeRoi Jones

We tiptoed the tops of beaver dams, hopped hummocks, went wading, looked at spring flowers, tried to catcha snake, got lost and found. How fine it was to move at a meandery, child's pace. ~ David Sobel

Ten bucks says the virgin dies before the slut," I said, taking a sip of my soda.
"You're on. Oh, hey, don't go in the shower, for God's sake," Nick advised the scantily dressed college student on the screen as she tiptoed into the bathroom. He stuffed a fistful of popcorn into his mouth. "Well, okay, there you go," he added as she was slashed to death by Freddy's fingernails. "Can't say I didn't warn you. Your poor parents. ~ Kristan Higgins

How sad it was, Carmen thought, that you acted awful when you were desperately sad and hurt and wanted to be loved. How tragic then, the way everyone avoided you and tiptoed around you when you really needed them. Carmen knew this vicious predicament as well as anyone in the world. How bitter it felt when you acted badly to everyone and ended up hating yourself the most. ~ Ann Brashares

Unburdening, she'd told Laurie about a vision she'd had when she was four or five years old. Unable to sleep on Christmas Eve, she'd tiptoed downstairs and seen a fat bearded man standing in front of her family's tree, checking items off a list. He wasn't wearing a red suit - it was more like a blue bus driver's uniform - but she still recognized him as Santa Claus. She watched him for a while, then snuck back upstairs, her body filled with an ecstatic sense of wonder and confirmation. As a teenager, she convinced herself that the whole thing had been a dream, but it had seemed real at the time, so real that she reported it to her family the next morning as a simple fact. They still jokingly referred to it that way, as though it were a documented historical event - the Night Meg Saw Santa. ~ Tom Perrotta

Kevin tried to sleep with a pillow tight over his face, and he nearly suffocated himself. When he tiptoed over to close the door, they were talking in a subdued tone on the narrow couch. Colette's bare legs were curled up on the pillows, her head riding on the camelback motion of his chest. But her eyes were open, and she looked more adrift than comforted. In a tired baritone, Jerry was talking about prison. It was a horror story -- about the echoing screams of young kids and eyeballs cut open with smuggled razor blades, beginning as the usual speech about the hell he'd seen. But somehow it bcame a lonesome country-western love song, about how every long night of his life he had dreamed of a woman like her-- quick-witted and beautiful and tenacious. It was more than Kevin expected from the man. He told her that if he could buy her safe passage out of this life, hers and Kevin's, he would; but it was hard with a teenage son always pressing to know more and a tiring and insatiable young girlfriend who wanted to devour the world. Think of the pressure on him. "You need to know that we're together like this partly because of you. You keep us up and running. I know it and Kevin knows it. I'm not a good person, Colette -- I never claimed to be, I don't want to be, and you can't expect me to be. But look me in the eye and accept me as a snake, and I'll tell you whatever you're waiting to hear: I need you, I want you, I hurt for you, down in the dust, honey, down in the dust of my bo ~ Peter Craig

Neva closed her eyes and prayed aloud, asking God to kiss Belle's dreams with all things pleasant and awaken her in the morning with the reminder of His unwavering presence. Then she gave her daughter a hug and a kiss and tiptoed from the room. ~ Kim Vogel Sawyer