leery

comparative leerier · superlative leeriest · alternative leary

1. Cautious, suspicious, wary, hesitant, or nervous about something; having reservations or concerns.

   Since he was bitten by a dog when he was young, he has always been leery of animals.

   3 more examples

   “[…]He was one of their top gun-fighters—always up to his ears in the thick of any fightin' that was goin' on. He never was leery of anything on two feet, I'll say that much for'm.”

   1913 October, Jack London, chapter X, in The Valley of the Moon, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, →OCLC

   “He's so darn afraid you'll be offended if he smokes. You scare him. Every time he speaks of the weather you jump him because he ain't talking about poetry or Gertie—Goethe?—or some other highbrow junk. You've got him so leery he scarcely dares to come here.”

   1920, Sinclair Lewis, chapter XIV, in Main Street: The Story of Carol Kennicott, New York, N.Y.: Harcourt, Brace and Howe, →OCLC

   It probably seems crazy, crazy, a graveyard theory A ghost tried to approach me, he got leery

   2001, “A Ghost’s Pumpkin Soup ...for Pumpkin Hill”, in Sonic Adventure 2

2. UKobsoleteslangSly; artful; knowing.
3. Leering; lecherous or unpleasant.

   And there was a particularly brutal villain with leery eyes, ugly mouth, with one tooth gone, and an iron jaw like a hull-dog's.

   1902, Francis Hopkinson Smith, chapter X, in The Fortunes of Oliver Horn