Most Ardently

by Gabe Cole Novoa

Then Darcy was looking at him and Oliver froze. Everything in him demanded he look away before he was caught staring, but it was already too late, and Oliver found he couldn’t pull his gaze from him. There was something magnetic about Darcy’s dark eyes, about his slightly furrowed brow as the boy held eye contact with him. Oliver’s face warmed, his heart pounding in his ears so loudly the music of the room fell away. Though he was trapped like a moth pinned to a board, from that distance Oliver couldn’t quite make out the color of Darcy’s eyes. Green? Brown? Somewhere in between? Whatever the color, the boy’s eyes were pulling him in—until, all at once, they turned flinty. Darcy’s lips thinned, his brow furrowed more deeply, and something like disgust flashed over his handsome features. He shook his head and looked away.