Reading To Each Other - Blog Posts

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✨🐟CALCULATING... CALCULATING... 🐟✨

✨🐟PROMPT FILLED: READING TO EACH OTHER 🐟✨

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Reading to Each Other 🪻

day one of tuna tober y'all!! i'm SO fricking excited! :D

Ship: Duke Leopold Mountbatten x f!Reader

Rating: 13+

Wordcount: 1.3k

Warnings: lots of LOTR, tobacco mention, riddles, kissing, cuddles

Series: Leg's Tuna Tober

It was a quiet Sunday afternoon. Rain pattered on your apartment's windows, the occasional roll of thunder booming outside. The spiced scent of your pumpkin candle floated through the living room air. Warm light shone from shaded lamps positioned on either end of your green-clothed sofa. A thick, soft blanket was draped over your lap.

You held your worn copy of The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien. Images of a dark cave filled with still water and an eerie sense of calm floated from the yellowed pages. Sounds of whispered riddles and shaking hands holding shining jewelry bounced around inside your head. It was nearly impossible to read Tolkien and not get entirely engrossed.

"How's your book?" Leo asked from the other end of the couch.

You nearly jumped out of your skin. Your head snapped up from where you'd been hunched over your book, eyes wide, as you met Leo's amused gaze. A light laugh filtered through his bright smile.

"Sorry! Didn't mean to alarm you," he said, amusement clearly indicating that he wasn't sorry in the slightest. You shook your head and sighed at his antics.

"Uh huh. Sure," you groused with a growing smile.

Leo was equally curled up on his side of the sofa. Fluffy blanket draped across his lap, glasses fitted over his thin nose, copy of Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen balanced in one of his hands. Hazel eyes trailed over the "grumpy" expression you'd forced over your face.

"Anything interesting standing out so far?" he asked, nodding to the book still clutched in your hands.

"I'm at one of my favorite parts, if that's what you mean," you replied as you burrowed deeper into the couch cushions. Leo tucked his bookmark into his novel, then set the book and his glasses on the end table nearest him.

"Care to elaborate?" he pressed with a cocked eyebrow. You bit your lip as you scanned over the pages again. Hisses and riddles and splashes of ground water leapt from the ink. Hmm. Riddles.

"Well, this part is about Bilbo bargaining, with a creature named Gollum, for his life. They're exchanging riddles as a sort of game," you explained, trying your best to not confuse a man who'd never heard of the Lord of the Rings.

"And what riddles are they?" Leo asked with a growing smile. He crossed his legs under his blanket to give you his undivided attention. You glanced between him and the book in your hands.

"You want to try and solve the riddles, or do you want me to read the whole part?"

"Just the riddles," he specified. You hummed in response.

"Alright, just know that they can get pretty tricky," you said in a singsong manner. Leo stared at you with apt interest as you turned to the correct page in your book. Inked words flew past your eyes, descriptions of swords and hobbits and tobacco and goblins filling your mind, nearly sucking you back into the story, before you found the first riddle. You cleared your throat and read, "What has roots as nobody sees, is taller than trees, up, up it goes, and yet never grows?"

"Has to be a mountain, isn't it?" Leo guessed almost immediately. He seemed rather confident in his answer, dimples digging into his cheeks with how wide his smile had stretched.

"Yup. Mountain," you answered, already thinking of which riddle to do next. Do you be nice and keep giving him the easier ones, or kick it up a notch? He did invent the elevator, after all.

"Give us a harder one, love," he said. That decides it for you, then.

"It cannot be seen, cannot be felt. Cannot be heard, cannot be smelt. It lies behind stars and under hills, and empty holes it fills. It comes first and follows after, ends life, kills laughter."

Leo blew out a long stream of air, "When I said hard, I didn't mean that hard!"

You refrained from making the obvious joke brewing at the back of your throat. An involuntary giggle leaked from your lips. You tried to play it off by resting your chin in your hand, fingers digging into your lips, to keep yourself quiet.

The room was quiet for a few moments as Leo considered the riddle. Raindrops trailed down the window, rivulets chasing each other and creating long tails that winded up the glass. This Sunday, utterly serene in its quality, was one of many you'd gotten to experience with Leo. Something about him just garnered peace in your life.

"Do I get a hint?" he asked with a sigh. You grinned at him from under your fingers.

"If Bilbo doesn't get a hint, neither do you," you said. Leo groaned, leaning back on the sofa and throwing an arm over his face. You couldn't help the laugh that breezed between your fingers.

"You are undeniably cruel," he grumbled under his arm.

"You wanted a harder riddle," you replied with a shrug. Leo grunted in return, making you laugh again. You waited a few more moments, letting him agonize over the riddle, before you decided to take pity, "What is it when your eyes are closed?"

"The hell are you on about? Is this a part two to the riddle?" Leo groused.

The blanket in your lap pooled into a pile on the floor as you crawled across the couch. Your sweatpants-clad legs framed Leo's hips, your hands running up his sides, as you sat in his lap. He begrudgingly lowered his arm and met your eyes.

"That was a clue. What do you see when you close your eyes?" you repeated as you ran your palms up and down his forearms. Leo's expression softened slightly.

"A spot of mercy," he said, smile returning, "I was wrong in labeling you cruel."

"Yeah yeah, Mr.1876. Just answer the damn riddle," you said as you rolled your eyes. Leo's warm palms found their usual place on your hips.

"You can't see it, feel it, hear it, or smell it. And closing my eyes has something to do with it," he listed, tongue darting across his bottom lip. A few more moments filled with pondering passed.

"For god's sake," you breathed as you clapped your hand over his eyes. The two of you had been together for so long that the action had hardly surprised him. You waited for a moment in hope that this obvious clue would help. Being met with only silence, you said, "What do you see right now?"

"Your hand, for one," Leo quipped back. He flinched with a laugh when you pinched him with your free hand.

"Close your frickin' eyes, Leo."

Silence settled over the two of you. Warm, comfortable, charged with amusement at your situation. Only Leo's smile could be seen from under your hand. His thumbs tucked under the hem of your t-shirt.

"It's dark," he finally said. You gave him a few moments to connect the dots. A gasp shook his chest, "Dark! That's the answer!"

"Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner!" you exclaimed as you dropped your hand from his eyes.

Pure elation crinkled in the corners of his hazel eyes. He hugged you closer to his chest, a laugh shaking where your bodies met. You couldn't help but join in. Your arms wrapped around his shoulders to steady yourself.

"Do I get a prize for so effortlessly solving the riddle?" Leo asked with a hint of sarcasm after the two of you had calmed a bit.

"I'm deducting points for the use of a hint," you hummed, feigning consideration at his question.

"And those points, will they affect the prize I know I've earned?"

You answered his question by pressing your lips to his. Both smiling, both clinging to the other with absolute adoration, the occasional giggle buzzing between you.

It was a quiet Sunday afternoon. It was raining outside, your candle had burnt down to the wick, and you were cradled in Leo's lap as you both read your respective books. Your back to his chest, blanket draped over both of your laps, his cheek rested on the crown of your head. Every now and then you'd read a part of your book aloud, garnering the same in return from Leo.

AHHHHHHHHH this is so frickin cute i might CRY!!! happy tuna tober everyone!!!