tensing

Though my back initially kept tensing at the sharper touch, it soon relaxed into the sensation, as if my body were recalling those childhood back scratches.

I point and flex my foot, stretching and tensing through my entire leg as much as I can.

A grim Donald J. Trump leaned back from the defendant’s table inside a jammed 13th-floor courtroom in Miami on Tuesday, jaw set, arms crossed, his back muscles tensing visibly under his dark suit jacket.

“I’m tensing up. There’s a lot of stuff I can do to protect myself.”

She said she doesn't recall hearing any bang from the explosion, but remembers tensing after feeling a large gust of wind hitting her.