Overwound

Everyone else Christian had had anything to do with, ever since the bad night outside Alexandria, had seemed to be overwound, jumpy, bitter, hysterical, overtired...

He has left his class, at least in spirit, by being in certain ways unusual; and he is still unusual in another class, too tense and overwound.

Eric's boss had accused him more than once of being a worrier, but Eric hadn't felt this overwound since his previous employer's stock underwent a dot-bomb implosion.

He [Cheney] could only exist with a chief executive self-absorbed in his resentments, narrow in experience and intellectual scope, and who does not hold his vice president accountable; an incompetent national security advisor, overwound in her eagerness to please; and a secretary of state who never presses his advantages but accepts his internal defeats, playing the good soldier.