Using "less" as a pager with conditional exit and input forwarding

How can I use less with the following requirements? 1. I want to use less and scroll up and down with the arrow keys. 2. If the entire output fits on the screen, less should automatically exit. 3. When I type something and press Enter, less should exit, and the input should be passed to read or to a variable, so I can process it. 4. I don't want to use :q, Ctrl-C, or similar commands to exit. Example,I run lsblk | less and want to enter a device name like sdx, which should be passed to a variable for further processing. Is this possible? I would appreciate a solution.