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fleeting
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show 189 more with this conextual meaning
  • And she answered, "Just fine," and wished, for a fleeting moment, that she could stay with them forever in that sunny, untidy little house by the pond.   (source)
    fleeting = short-lived (lasting just a short time)
  • You couldn't blame him, no, you couldn't fault him for wanting to go deeper into every fleeting moment, to study its mystery, to shout against loss and change and motion.   (source)
    fleeting = lasting a short time
  • Ginny jumped up as though her chair had just been electrified, gave Percy a fleeting, frightened look, and scampered away.†   (source)
  • In a fleeting moment of dread, Officer Delinko wondered if it was already the next night.†   (source)
  • I had never seen him look more desolately alone, and for a fleeting second I felt almost sorry for him.†   (source)
  • Lale and Gita will be among the brave souls walking in the compound, in the hope of a fleeting meeting, a word, a touch of the hand.†   (source)
  • He spread his blanket in a corner and caught a fleeting glimpse of a plump rat as it scurried off, squeaking.†   (source)
  • And second chances are pretty fleeting.†   (source)
  • I can see her in my mind, but it's fleeting.†   (source)
  • I felt a fleeting gratitude that it wasn't just me he looked at like that.†   (source)
  • In that fleeting instant, Sophie saw images from the dream that had awoken her countless times when she was a little girl: My family is alive!†   (source)
  • He felt the slightest hint of peace, as fleeting as it was, and tried to enjoy it for however long it might last.†   (source)
  • His fingers brushed her cheeks where the scratches were almost healed, and ran fleetingly across her lips.†   (source)
  • The breath of the boys pulses out before them in a collective fleeting cloud that is stripped away quickly by the wind.†   (source)
  • It was there in the rhythms of the long nights and the fleeting days.†   (source)
  • I like to think it was a fleeting moment of satisfaction for my dear old professor: he had finally made me cry.†   (source)
  • All he could conjure up were fleeting notions: He couldn't stand up.†   (source)
  • For a brief moment Art understood Carl's face as the sort of illusion men are prone to at sea—or hoped it was this, rather, with a fleeting desperation—but then as the net reeled in Carl's bearded throat appeared too and the face completed itself.†   (source)
  • Might there not be a single overlooked drawer, unopened for twenty-two years, that would breathe forth a single, fleeting exhalation?†   (source)
  • Josie realized, fleetingly, that she had already learned that lesson from her mother.†   (source)
  • Those summer nights of 1958 were the first nights I remember feeling "grown up"; we'd drive half an hour from Gravesend for the fleeting privilege of inching along a crowded, gaudy strip of beachfront, looking at girls who rarely looked at us.†   (source)
  • I'm twenty-four now, I live in Baden, Elsa County, Iowa, but every time I lift a glass of water to my lips, fleetingly I smell it.†   (source)
  • Already the joy is fleeting.†   (source)
  • My attempt to act normal was not helped by the fact that every little noise or fleeting movement made me jump.†   (source)
  • And for just a fleeting moment, a tiny wisp of time that hung in the air like fireflies in summer skies, she wondered if she was in love with him again.†   (source)
  • My hands dart in and out, always in fleeting touches.†   (source)
  • For a moment — a fleeting moment — Kate looked desperately sad.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting moment I looked out the window.†   (source)
  • These are fleeting moments of private disquiet, only dispelled by abandoning herself to the joy and excitement of those around her.†   (source)
  • But these were fleeting thoughts.†   (source)
  • He'd had a fleeting romantic impulse — maybe he should cut off a piece of Oryx's dark braid — but he'd resisted it.†   (source)
  • For a moment he had a fleeting picture of the strange glamour that had once invested the beaches.†   (source)
  • A rosy-cheeked boy on the second step, with one fleeting motion, captured a fly and held it imprisoned against his knees.†   (source)
  • Insane in the way she sifted through dark things in a closet and emerged with the most unlikely ones—a fleeting look, a feeling.†   (source)
  • She whips the hose back and forth, laughing as he chases it, the fleeting, uncatchable colors, shimmering splinters of the golden light.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting moment they become fashionable and I get a major award.†   (source)
  • Root allowed himself a fleeting grin, then it was back to business.†   (source)
  • Fleeting grimace—gone almost the moment I saw it.†   (source)
  • Pim always acts like the elderly father who once had the same fleeting impulses, but who can no longer relate to me as a friend, no matter how hard he tries.†   (source)
  • Enrique realizes that the friendships will be fleeting.†   (source)
  • Just like earlier, the touch is as fleeting and cool as wind.†   (source)
  • He had one fleeting image of a wall of brown hair with the feathers of the arrow sticking out of the middle and he went down.†   (source)
  • Sometimes they are small and fleeting—my grandmother holding a glass of water and opening her mouth to say something—but I never know the words because the image vanishes as quickly as it came.†   (source)
  • And when there was a useful scene, it was difficult to see it more than fleetingly because there were usually twenty others in the room watching with you.†   (source)
  • He tried to catch up with Solembum, but glimpsed him only fleetingly in the abandoned passageways.†   (source)
  • But no matter how fast they traveled, their escape would be as fleeting as a wisp of smoke in a fog.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting pause, everything felt oddly warm and peaceful, his ire momentarily knocked out by the impact.†   (source)
  • The image is fleeting, and it could be my imagination, not a memory.†   (source)
  • We had shared something that night on the pavement—one of those brief, fleeting moments of clarity that define all the others in a life—that neither of us would soon forget.†   (source)
  • Because every bit of it, every last bit of it, is fleeting.†   (source)
  • But for one fleeting instant, I caught his eyes on us and a look of recognition dawning on his face.†   (source)
  • I took the most fleeting look I could manage.†   (source)
  • They speak in that slightly strained, silly way that he associates now with flirtation — the exchange feels desperately arbitrary, fleeting.†   (source)
  • It's that precious, fleeting time before we have accumulated enough pride or position to care what other people might think.†   (source)
  • He must have been busy as a beaver during his fleeting school days.†   (source)
  • Only during fleeting moments did I allow myself to have fantasies of what it might he like to sing with the chorus or perform in the Thanksgiving program.†   (source)
  • Those thoughts were fleeting.†   (source)
  • True happiness lies in not being dependent on such random and fleeting things.†   (source)
  • The host of vampires moved in the shadows, their candles whipped and fleeting on the cool air; and above them loomed a great broadcast of ink-drawn figures: the sleeping corpse of a woman ravaged by a vulture with a human face; a naked man bound hand and foot to a tree, beside him hanging the torso of another, his severed arms tied still to another branch, and on a spike this dead man's staring head.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting moment Isabelle looked uncomfortable.†   (source)
  • "I saw you," I say at last, and I feel euphoria, fleeting but unmistakable, when I say the words out loud.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting second he was literally scared shitless.†   (source)
  • In modern times Ole Miss's football team had enjoyed only the briefest and most fleeting moments of glory but had always been good at sending offensive linemen to the NFL.†   (source)
  • The next morning when I woke up I realized I hadn't dreamed at all, not even one fleeting image.†   (source)
  • The billboard is a classic, a chestnut, not a figment of some fleeting Mafia promotional campaign.†   (source)
  • I couldn't know that years later I would see her once again for a fleeting second just as she was then, with orange blossoms in her hair and a rosary in her hands.†   (source)
  • When you're moving on toward forty hours without sleep, the mind starts playing tricks, causing fleeting thoughts suddenly to become reality.†   (source)
  • If you show people pictures of a smiling face or a frowning face, they'll smile or frown back, although perhaps only in muscular changes so fleeting that they can only be captured with electronic sensors.†   (source)
  • After the first letter that she carried to the telegraph office with an ember of revenge against her own destiny, she had allowed an almost daily exchange of messages in what appeared to be casual encounters on the street, but she did not have the courage to permit a conversation, no matter how banal and fleeting it might be.†   (source)
  • But they're so vague and fleeting that I can hardly put them into words.†   (source)
  • The mass was ending, the fleeting mystery was already vanishing.†   (source)
  • I had a fleeting vision of a pale blue envelope with a Yale crest on the back flap.†   (source)
  • I think I detect the fleeting shadow of a sneer across Sarah Byrnes's lip as I slip onto the seat beside her, but I know it must be my imagination, and I can't help thinking back to what Dale Thornton said that day.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting moment, the glassy stupor in his eyes disappeared, something twisted and sinister eclipsing it.†   (source)
  • She gave me a fleeting frown.†   (source)
  • My mam's chapped lips and fleeting smile, the melancholy that filled our home in Kinvara and traveled with us across the ocean to take up permanent residence in the dim corners of our tenement apartment in New York.†   (source)
  • When he looked back at Abby, he saw that fleeting look of fear on her face again.†   (source)
  • I fleetingly caught a glimpse of Roy Lee leaping over the still-standing part of the fence, clearing it by a good yard.†   (source)
  • The warning was fleeting, banished to the back corners of my mind, where it wouldn't interrupt how good it felt to touch him—how right.†   (source)
  • It reminds me of Oregon, where the rain falls endlessly, and even on the hottest of summer days, blooming white cumulus clouds float above, their shadows reminding you that summer's heat is fleeting, and the rain's never far off.†   (source)
  • The world was a series of fleeting gratifications.†   (source)
  • Even Judith, in her agony on the ground, could see him, fleetingly, as she was thrashed around screaming through the snow.†   (source)
  • The excitement of the hunt was so strong in me, even the sight of the ax brought back only a fleeting remembrance of Rubin's accident.†   (source)
  • His name becomes a fleeting statistic and his face is lost in fading photographs, the clothing quaint, the anecdotes gone.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting moment they'd have the same awareness of us that we had of them.†   (source)
  • The worst thing she had ever wanted to do to a child was to slap the spit out of the little Baxter boy for pouring glue in her hair, and even that had only been for a fleeting moment.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting moment I thought maybe the judge had changed his mind, or that there had been an awful mistake and everyone now realized that I was really a good kid and now they were going to give me a slap on the wrist and let me go.†   (source)
  • Once, true, he had been a titan, but now, now What happens here that you arent going to read is the six-page soliloquy from Inigo in which Morgenstern, through Inigo, reflects on the anguish of fleeting glory.†   (source)
  • But the satisfaction was fleeting.†   (source)
  • Augustus had had only a fleeting contact with the language and had no real opportunity to improve his knowledge; once he had been caught in an ice storm on the plains and had torn out a number of pages of the grammar in order to get a fire started.†   (source)
  • She turned to him fleetingly a countenance of appeal and perplexity.†   (source)
  • I saw him a fleeting once.†   (source)
  • "I wondered fleetingly what even a government of saints and scholars could do in the face of such odds," he wrote shortly afterward in his journal.†   (source)
  • Still, for just a moment I saw that fleeting smile that Miss Ethelward guarded so carefully.†   (source)
  • He could interpret their naked presence in his hands only as a cosmic oversight destined to be rectified speedily, and he was driven always to make what carnal use of them he could in the fleeting moment or two he felt he had before Someone caught wise and whisked them away.†   (source)
  • I was still six years old when they buried him beside my grandfather, my mother's father, and the sliver of life he had was too narrow, too fleeting, to register very much in my memory.†   (source)
  • There were fleeting glimpses of daylight and the soft patter of rain.†   (source)
  • I wondered whether this was just a fleeting tantrum or whether he was gone for good.†   (source)
  • A fleeting memory of a bedtime story, ghosts and goblins and witches hiding in the shadows?†   (source)
  • Sleep was fleeting these nights as Lettie found herself yielding even more space to her family.†   (source)
  • That thought is not fleeting.†   (source)
  • frail and fleeting as little leaves, under the enduring shadow of the sentinels of Numenor.†   (source)
  • I know the voice of fame to be a mere weathercock, unstable as water and fleeting as a shadow.†   (source)
  • But his mouth pressed into mine again, and that tiny, fleeting thought died.†   (source)
  • And since, all his thoughts of the professor had been fleeting and commingled with regret, and sorrow, and an overwhelming sense of failure.†   (source)
  • These memories of happiness are fleeting things, reflections in a stream, glimpsed all broken for a second and then swept away in the current of grief that is our life now.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting moment he felt relieved that his dream was only that, a dream.†   (source)
  • I had the fleeting thought that I should thank my gym teacher, Mr. Graves, for the three weeks of football instruction.†   (source)
  • Wells felt a fleeting urge to touch his father's arm, but something other than the handcuffs shackling his wrists kept him from reaching across the desk.†   (source)
  • My sister was gone, my grandmother a fleeting Sunday apparition, and God, if not dead, far removed from my concern.†   (source)
  • I catch a fleeting look of relief from Sylvia.†   (source)
  • They reminded me fleetingly of prisoners carrying their leg irons as they escaped from a chain gang.†   (source)
  • He had a fleeting glimpse of the main street.†   (source)
  • What had happened that afternoon was simply one of those fleeting moments the photographer sometimes came across when the moment dictated the scene.†   (source)
  • Her astonishment, however, was so brief as to be fleeting; there were no cracks whatsoever in her composure.†   (source)
  • I remember having a fleeting thought that maybe they'd hit the third rail and vaporize, but that didn't happen.†   (source)
  • It was fleeting, but it was a fraction of a second that Norberto would never forget.†   (source)
  • The days of large life and uncomplicated success were fleeting.†   (source)
  • With only a fleeting thought of Mick, I give in to this insane desire to know this not-quite-stranger in the most intimate way.†   (source)
  • For a lot of guys, keeping the balance between work and family life was fleeting.†   (source)
  • His height and his posture had been the cause of many thousands of fleeting internal debates as people who passed him on the street tried to decide whether or not he was a dwarf and whether or not he was a hunchback.†   (source)
  • My fleeting thought up at Big Sur was that maybe he knew where Naomi was, and I couldn't let him get away.†   (source)
  • The smile of a stranger may seem to be a fleeting, insignificant moment to others, but I remember it vividly because it set the mood for my new life.†   (source)
  • So Dart stayed out of the way, or reduced himself to a fleeting, smiling presence, like a well-meaning ghost harmlessly haunting the endless corridors.†   (source)
  • So when he saw it—when he first entered a village south of Chu Lai—he felt a kind of mild surprise, fleeting compassion, but not amazement.†   (source)
  • The tremulous surface of each serving glimmered jewel-like, and Joe wondered fleetingly if something had been in the wine—poison, chemical, drug.†   (source)
  • Polliver gave her a fleeting glance and the boy beside him never looked at her at all, but the third one gazed long and hard.†   (source)
  • "Nonono," Ralph protested, thinking, fleetingly, Typical American wasteful.†   (source)
  • In my mind, I envisioned Junior's head exploding as I beat him with the stick and relived the fleeting feeling of satisfaction the fantasy had given me.†   (source)
  • Their warmth is fleeting, like a winter sun passing through clouds, and what I have left is the nervous heat of my retorts.†   (source)
  • Before I can tell him, Actually I am, which is part of the problem; we are all alone, trapped in these bodies and our own minds, and whatever company we have in this life is only fleeting and superficial, he tightens his grip until I worry my arm will snap off.†   (source)
  • I took no weapons of any kind, although there were times when I regretted this omission, even if only fleetingly.†   (source)
  • I suddenly worried whether I was properly clothed, and had a fleeting notion that I should be wearing a hat.†   (source)
  • He felt sorry for her, fleetingly, and looked up at the light above the table, then down at the Daily News.†   (source)
  • Before I did so, though, I saw a fleeting shadow.†   (source)
  • But after this, she had aroused him, and had tied him to her in the act of making love with painful fervour, biting and in tears, as if, once more, she wanted to squeeze the last sweet drop out of this vain, fleeting pleasure.†   (source)
  • And to the muttering of the wind Yurii Andreievich slept and woke and slept again in a quick, troubled alternation of joy and suffering, as fleeting and disturbing as the changing weather, as the restless night.†   (source)
  • Clarence is come, false, fleeting, perjured Clarence, That stabbed me in the field by Tewksbury.†   (source)
  • It's not the flowers that are fleeting, Nina thought, it's the fruitsit's the time when things are ready that they don't stay.†   (source)
  • But theirs was a fleeting victory.†   (source)
  • Sensual pleasures have the fleeting brilliance of a comet; a happy marriage has the tranquility of a lovely sunset.   (source)
  • The river is silver, the shadows are fleeting;
    Merry is May-time, and merry our meeting.   (source)
  • The mere fleeting glimpses of treasure which they had caught as they went along had rekindled all the fire of their dwarvish hearts; and when the heart of a dwarf, even the most respectable, is wakened by gold and by jewels, he grows suddenly bold, and he may become fierce.   (source)
    fleeting = brief (lasting a short time)
  • The times I've returned were only fleeting stays, vanishing flecks of memory by our measurement.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting second, Harry had a strange desire to join the Ravenclaw table too.†   (source)
  • I could see, fleetingly, the way the world looked to him.†   (source)
  • I held my breath for a fleeting second, then before my courage disappeared I blurted out, "You, sir!†   (source)
  • Edward glanced down at me for a fleeting second with worried eyes.†   (source)
  • He looked fleetingly like a small boy caught in wrongdoing.†   (source)
  • Some fleeting emotion would flash across her face.†   (source)
  • As Snape swung the lantern about, Harry saw, fleetingly, a look of shock and anger on Tonks's face.†   (source)
  • For a few fleeting moments my pain, my hunger and my miserable way of life disappeared.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting instant, Harry thought he saw a gleam of something like triumph in Dumbledore's eyes.†   (source)
  • For a moment Thomas hates her, but it's fleeting.†   (source)
  • The falter in Langdon's eyes was fleeting but Leigh caught it.†   (source)
  • Here, he shot Mariam a fleeting look that was as hard as a steel-toed kick to the temple.†   (source)
  • A fleeting look of surprise crossed his face, turning almost immediately to alarm.†   (source)
  • I saw Harry fleetingly a couple of years ago at the recovery centre in Wiltshire.†   (source)
  • A fleeting glimmer of light surrounded him, and then the casket thudded back down.†   (source)
  • The extraordinary feeling was fleeting, but Sophie was sure she would never forget it.†   (source)
  • Marley reminded me of life's brevity, of its fleeting joys and missed opportunities.†   (source)
  • Relief dissolved the fleeting moment of panic, and he focused on the room itself.†   (source)
  • Since returning to the island, he had caught only one fleeting glimpse.†   (source)
  • Their previous fleeting kiss has ignited a year's worth of longing.†   (source)
  • He thought he saw Sirius and Lupin exchange the most fleeting of looks before Sirius answered.†   (source)
  • His worry is fleeting, however, and rage fills his eyes.†   (source)
  • A smile appears again, this time fleeting, tentative.†   (source)
  • For one fleeting moment I thought, "Him and his lies.†   (source)
  • To his great surprise, the Prime Minister felt a fleeting stab of pity for Fudge at this point.†   (source)
  • My curiosity on this point was fleeting, heavily overshadowed by more pressing emotions.†   (source)
  • Looking at the child, Kit felt again a fleeting uneasiness.†   (source)
  • And, despite all the horror and hopelessness, I was fleetingly happy.†   (source)
  • I saw his body, so immeasurably vital, stretched in the air above me, a fleeting, furred rainbow.†   (source)
  • Their gray uniforms passed like fleeting shadows through the confusion.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting moment, I thought I was dead.†   (source)
  • Ron, who was still very white, gave him a fleeting look, but did not speak.†   (source)
  • For a fleeting instant, Chartrand's soul fluttered.†   (source)
  • A fleeting expression crossed the Special's impassive face—annoyance mixed with suspicion.†   (source)
  • She noticed fleetingly that it was a perfect day, not a cloud in the sky.†   (source)
  • It was an odd memento, but it was one that for a fleeting instant had given him hope.†   (source)
  • There was a fleeting instant of hesitation as everyone's eyes took in the bizarre image.†   (source)
  • Allie watched them and felt a pang of fleeting despair for the sad times of the world.†   (source)
  • With life so seemingly fleeting, did he rush to judgment to marry?†   (source)
  • Even more shocking was how grateful I'd felt, if only fleetingly, to find her there.†   (source)
  • We were only converging for a few weeks, fleeting.†   (source)
  • Miles made no move toward Brian, and for a fleeting second, Brian had the urge to run.†   (source)
  • Mark has the fleeting thought that they should try to help them, reach for their hands.†   (source)
  • Simon thought fleetingly of Maureen, and felt sick.†   (source)
  • He experienced a fleeting sense of discovery.†   (source)
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