🎁 Leona’s Present 🎁
⋆ ˚。⋆୨୧˚Strawbetty’s notes˚୨୧⋆。˚ ⋆
🍓 Leona Kingscholar x gn!reader. Leona and gn!reader are in an established romantic relationship.
🍓 Warning: none; an all-fluff story, enjoy~ Also, I depicted Christmas as more of a celebratory/romantic holiday in this fic since I personally don’t celebrate Christmas religiously.
🍓Text borders used from “Cute Kaomoji”
🍓 Extra notes: This story is for @bunnwich’s and @comingyourlugubriousness’s winter 2022 event! Happy Holidays, everyone! :)
🍓 Update: Mini story following this one here!
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❅*⋆⍋*∞*。*∞*⍋⋆*❅。..。❅*⋆⍋*∞*。*∞*⍋⋆ ❅
The candied-orange and eggnog-yellow flickers of fire crackled in the fireplace of the living room as powdered-sugar-white snow fell outside onto Ramshackle dorm’s windows.
You wrapped the pink quilt embroidered with gingerbread houses and snowmen around yourself tighter and shifted a bit in your laying position on the green-and-white-striped holed-up couch.
Before you, the oak coffee table held various wrapped dishes: a bucket of fried chicken, a box of cheese pizza, and a bowl of potato salad. The flimsy film of the wrappers on each dish began to clear up as the steam on each dish lessened.
You reached for your phone, which rested on top of your stomach. 11:50 p.m. Leona was still out delivering presents to all beings of Twisted Wonderland with Idia Shroud due to their roles as the respective Trusty Reindeer and The Green One.
The last texts Leona sent you were “Going to Scalding Sands now” and a picture of the dazzling night sky above Scalding Sands dotted with diamond clusters of stars.
You knew that it probably wouldn’t be realistic for Leona to return to campus by midnight; he’d probably come back from flying around the world on Idia’s high-tech chariot by the dawn of Christmas.
However, you still had a smidge of hope that Leona would get to have a belated Christmas Eve dinner with you. Grim and the Ramshackle Ghosts already went upstairs to sleep hours ago, and you insisted to them that you would wait up for Leona.
11:58 p.m. You pulled the quilt over your head, too comfy on the couch by now to want to trudge up the rickety wooden staircase to your and Grim’s room. It’s ok, I’ll see Leona tomorrow.
Your eyes fluttered shut and you shifted your head on the couch’s throw pillow, which was a tad uncomfortable due to you hiding Leona’s present under it. Still, you found yourself unable to sleep as you wondered where in the world Leona was now.
Was Leona flying over the snowy mountains of the Shaftlands? Or was he flying over the lush grasslands of Afterglow Savannah? As you drifted off into dreamland, you hoped that wherever he was right now, Leona was at least keeping warm.
12:25 a.m.
The knob of the Ramshackle front door clicked, and the quiet dorm filled with the thuds of footsteps from heavy boots that could only belong to a certain Trusty Reindeer.
Leona closed the door and slipped out of his black snow boots. He yawned, rubbing his hands covered by mittens together after trekking through the snow-covered campus from Main Street (where Idia dropped Leona off) to Ramshackle.
There wasn’t a crack of light in Ramshackle except for in the living room, which emitted a soft golden glow. Leona made his way to the living room, following the scent of food and the sound of your snores.
Too tired to take off his reindeer antler headband, mittens, and knitted outerwear, Leona approached the couch with half-lidded eyes. He lifted your quilt, diving under the quilt to join you. Not caring that he would wake you up, Leona wrapped his arms around your waist.
Home. Leona buried his nose into the crook of your neck, eyes fluttering shut as he inhaled your familiar and comforting scent.
“Leona?” your voice, albeit somewhat groggy, was the only Christmas melody Leona needed to hear. The first thing you saw when you woke up was Leona’s reindeer antler headband. “When did you get here?”
“Just now,” Leona hummed, not bothering to lift his head up or open his eyes. Your hands wriggled up from underneath him to flick the golden jingle bells on his reindeer antler headband.
“Welcome home, my Trusty Reindeer,” you giggled at the merry jingling of the bells. Leona lifted his head up to greet you with his mistletoe-green eyes.
“I’m not a reindeer, herbivore,” the lion beastman huffed at the headband. “Tch, being stuck as a Trusty Reindeer with that Radish Sprout as the Green One is real tiresome.”
“Really?” you tapped the tip of Leona’s nose, which shone a faint shade of red due to flying through the chilly winter sky for hours on end. “‘Cuz your nose is as red as a reindeer’s.”
Leona replied by leaning forward and rubbing his nose against yours. “There, my nose is warm now.”
“Is being the Trusty Reindeer really that bad?” you smiled and arched an eyebrow as Leona released you from his arms and the two of you sat up on the couch. He took off his mittens and then the reindeer antler headband, glad to be rid of it. “Also, how did you and Idia finish delivering presents so fast?”
Leona eyed the coffee table with wrapped food and grabbed the bucket of fried chicken; he didn’t have dinner earlier due to delivering presents nonstop with Idia.
“We used his drones to deliver gifts to people while I created a cloaking spell so people wouldn’t see the drones, us, and the chariot,” Leona explained as he munched on a fried chicken drumstick. “Not everyone’s gonna be asleep by like 10 p.m., so the mystery of the Green One delivering gifts isn’t really a mystery. The cloaking spell and drones helped in delivering presents faster and more efficiently, especially with all the time differences.”
“Sounds like you and Idia made a pretty good team,” you leaned your cheek against the palm of your propped-up elbow and tipped your gaze at Leona. “I know you don’t like being the Trusty Reindeer, but I’m really proud of you, Leona. You did important work.”
Leona’s munching slowed as he thought about all he and Idia saw during their journey around the world: households with full and happy families, households with families mourning the loss of loved ones, and those who didn’t even have homes or families.
He knew all those people’s names by memory from the letters he and Idia read and replied to weeks ago addressed to “The Green One,” and how those letters contained wishes for gifts, for love, for guidance, etc.
Other people’s business never really bothered nor affected Leona, but from his experiences as the Trusty Reindeer, Leona learned about others’ lives that were so different from his own, if only through a couple of sentences.
“Even if the Radish Sprout and I have to give people gifts and protect the spirit of Yuletide, there’s nothing we can do about their personal lives,” Leona set down the bucket of fried chicken and leaned back against the couch. “What’s the point of these roles then when there’s nothin’ he and I can do to help them, yet they look to us during this time of year for help?”
“Well,” you moved the quilt over your and Leona’s laps to keep the both of you warm. “I personally think that even by just giving people around the world gifts and replying to their letters, you and Idia are helping them in some way. You and Idia are reminding them that especially during this time of year, they aren’t alone.”
Leona gazed at you in silence for a few seconds before plopping his head onto your shoulder. “It’s giving ‘em false hope more than anything, but I can see what you’re saying, even if it is a real cheesy way of putting it,” Leona replied with his expression full of thought, without a hint of his usual snarkiness. “…This job’s tougher than I gave it credit for. And to answer your question earlier, no. Being the Trusty Reindeer, as troublesome as that title is, ain’t so bad.”
You intertwined your fingers through Leona’s, giving them a reassuring squeeze. “So will we be seeing you as the Trusty Reindeer next Christmas?” you teased. “Ah! Speaking of Christmas, I have your present.”
You revealed the gift you had hidden under the throw pillow: a somewhat-small rectangular box wrapped in ebony wrapping paper and tied with an emerald ribbon.
“That eager to exchange gifts, huh?” Leona smirked. You handed the gift to Leona, who tore through the ribbon and wrapping in an instant.
He opened the box, which contained a golden heart locket necklace. The inside of the locket revealed his cropped picture on the left heart and your cropped picture on the right heart. The two images of you and Leona were from a selfie you had on your phone. It was from when the two of you tried on matching lion onesies that one time Leona went fall shopping with you months before the two of you started dating. Leona’s comically grumpy expression while wearing the lion onesie contrasted your beaming expression, despite Leona leaning his head against yours with utter affection when you took the selfie.
“Heh, I remember when we took that photo,” Leona grinned down at the locket. “Did you know I was crushin’ on you by then?”
“Really?” you cooed as Leona scooted to sit with his back to you and gave you the necklace to put it on for him. You brushed his mane to the side and clasped the necklace around his neck.
“Yeah, I called you cute and everything,” Leona turned around to face you as the heart locket necklace dangled and glinted in front of his chest. “Thought I gave it away.”
“Well, now I know,” you snaked your arms around his neck and snuggled closer to Leona.
“Thank you,” Leona nuzzled the top of your head. “As for your gift, well, etiquette dictates that I have to give ya a gift too, but we both know my presence is a present in and of itself.”
You leaned back a bit to see Leona’s mischievous wink and ever-so-smug smirk, to which you responded with a loving eye roll.
“I’m kiddin’, ‘course I got you a gift.” Leona rummaged through the large front pocket of his knitted outerwear and took out a gift wrapped in (your favorite color) wrapping paper and tied with a slim gold ribbon.
“‘To Y/N’,” you read on the package as Leona handed it to you. “‘Love, Leona.’ Awww.”
You tore through the packaging, gasping in awe at a (your favorite color) notebook with gold-lined pages.
“Look at what’s inside,” Leona urged as a proud smile made its way onto his face at your cute expression.
Your fingers danced on the thick cover of the notebook as you opened it to the first page. To your surprise, penned words in black ink greeted you.
On each page, Leona wrote little diary entries of each place he visited during his journey with Idia to deliver presents. Each page was written from top to bottom with Leona’s thoughts and feelings to make you feel like you were there with him. He also started each diary entry with a timestamp.
One page read: “10:28 p.m. We just finished delivering gifts in Afterglow Savannah. I can’t believe I had to send a drone to my own home to deliver the furball’s gifts. Did you know Cheka wrote to the Green One asking for a ton of toys, but mostly asking for me to come home? Wouldn’t he be overjoyed to find out that I’ll be home tomorrow.”
You chuckled as you read Leona’s words. “Cheka would be so happy to know that you were the Trusty Reindeer,” you lifted your head up from reading the notebook to smile at Leona.
Leona would be spending the next few hours with you, but he also planned to go back to his family’s palace in Afterglow Savannah at 7 a.m. to celebrate Christmas morning with his family. He usually wouldn’t wake up so early, and Leona also dreaded the fact that Farena planned matching Christmas sweaters for the whole family, but he knew that a certain five-year-old nephew of his would leave him a million calls if he wasn’t home on Christmas morning.
“I can just see the furball pestering me with endless questions,” Leona sighed, despite feeling a teeny bit proud of himself for taking part in delivering his nephew’s Christmas gifts.
“How did you have time to write all of this?” you wondered aloud as you skimmed through more pages.
“I had a lot of time to kill when we were flying in the sky,” Leona leaned his head against yours to read one of his entries with you. “The Radish Sprout programmed the chariot to fly on autopilot, so I didn’t have to drive. Tch, he kept calling me ‘the bad-boy-type character with a hidden soft side’ when I was making your gift. Whatever that means.”
You couldn’t contain your laughter at Leona being called “the-bad-boy-type character with a hidden soft side” by Idia as you reached the last page.
The last page wasn’t as detailed as the previous pages; it simply contained the sentence “May we travel to all these places together in the future, because going to all these places sure as hell wasn’t half as fun without you” and Leona’s neat signature at the end.
Your eyes, which sparkled as bright as a star on top of a Christmas tree while reading the last sentence, began to tear up.
“I love it,” you set the notebook down to throw your arms around Leona’s neck and pepper him with kisses. “Merry Christmas, Leona.”
“Merry Christmas, Y/N,” Leona whispered, his hands caressing the curves of your sides. He tipped your chin up and leaned in to lock his lips with yours.
While Leona adored the heart locket necklace from you, there was no better present than your presence.
❅*⋆⍋*∞*。*∞*⍋⋆*❅。..。❅*⋆⍋*∞*。*∞*⍋⋆ ❅
⋆ ˚。⋆୨୧˚Important˚୨୧⋆。˚ ⋆
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