CHAPTER EIGHT:
UGLY DUCKLINGS

"Aloha! I'm home!" Lilo called out as she burst through the front door. "Stitch? Pleakley? Leera? Hey, where is everybody?"

Pleakley came scrambling out of the kitchen just then with a maniacal look on his face. "Lilo, SSSHHHHHHH!" he said in a loud whisper, pressing a finger to his lips. "Any loud noises and my soufflé is done for! And don't slam the — " BANG! "— door." Pleakley's eye twitched before he turned and went back to the kitchen. Lilo slung her backpack down on the floor and followed him quietly on tiptoe. The lack of wailing or alien curses must have meant that the soufflé had survived. When Lilo entered the kitchen, she found Pleakley bent over in front of the oven. She kept a safe distance as he pulled the soufflé out and set it on the counter. She sniffed the air.

"Mmmm. Smells good. What is it?"

"It's my very own secret recipe. Spinach-and-pineapple soufflé," Pleakley told her with pride.

"Buuuut, how can it be secret if you just told me what was in it?"

"Because I didn't tell you the secret ingredient: Mrs. Dash! Oops. You didn't just hear that."

Lilo grinned. "Got it."

"Lilo, be an angel and help me set the table, will you?" Pleakley asked her, before he noticed her dirty hands. "No wait! On second thought, why don't you just go wash up. And tell Stitch to wash up, too. I'm sure he's gotten pretty filthy by now, doing whatever it is little monsters do."

"Where is Stitch?" Lilo asked. "And where's Jumba and Leera and your mom?"

"Oh, they're all out back and… how did you know my mom was here?"

"I saw the spaceship out front."

"Yes, but that's not my mom's spaceship."

Lilo shrugged. "Well, I just figured that that meant she was here. We weren't expecting anyone else from outer space, were we?"

Pleakley hesitated a moment before answering. "No. We most certainly were not."

Lilo did not notice his sudden change in mood. "So did your mom get a new ship?"

"No. That's not her ship out there."

"Then whose is it? Your uncle's?"

"No. It's— "

The back door opened just then and in walked Vay, followed by Leera, Gidgel, Kirk, Jumba and Stitch.

"…And THAT is vhy they call it explodinginface fruit," Jumba was explaining to a slime-covered Kirk.

Lilo stared raptly at Pleakley's father as he stood waiting for Vay to hand him a towel to wipe his face off. "Cool! A sludge mummy!"

Vay chuckled, handing Kirk the towel. Then she knelt down to trade hugs with an ecstatic Lilo.

"Is the sludge mummy a friend of yours, Pleakley's Mom?"

"Not exactly. Wendy, love, would you like to make the introductions?"

Pleakley shrugged and snorted. "Yeah, sure. Lilo, this is Mr. Skirmish. Mr. Scumbag, Lilo."

"Wendy!"

"Sorry. Let me try again. Ahem! Allow me to introduce Mr. Scuzzball — uh, I mean Scurvy — I mean Skirmish!"

Lilo stared questioningly at Pleakley for a long moment before finally turning to look at Kirk. Then her face split in a wide grin and she extended a hand to him.

"H'lo there, Mr. Squeamish-Scumbag-Scuzzball-Scurvy-Skirmish! It's nice to finally meet a real live sludge mummy."

Kirk hesitated before shaking hands. "Um, charmed, I'm sure. However I'm not a sludge mummy. I'm a Plorginarian. And you are — ?"

"I'm Lilo."

"Uh-huh, and what exactly is a Lilo?"

"Me!"

Leera giggled and patted her on the head. "A Lilo is a very amusing and clever little human girl." Pleased with this answer, Lilo beamed and hugged Leera's belly.

"So are you a relative of Pleakley's?" she asked Kirk, after he managed to wipe most of the slime off his face.

"In a manner of speaking…" Kirk began, glancing first at Pleakley then at Vay for visual cues. "I'm Wendy's father."

Pleakley made a sound somewhere between clearing his throat and growling and turned back to his soufflé. Lilo was the only person who appeared not to notice this.

"Wow. I didn't know you had a dad, Pleakley!"

At this, Pleakley made another small noise which sounded an awful lot like the words "I don't," but this also went largely ignored or unnoticed.

"So how come I never heard about him before?" Lilo asked him, tugging on his apron. Pleakley kept his back to everyone as he replied, "Because he wasn't worth mentioning."

But Lilo was persistent. "Why not?" she asked innocently. "Don't you love your dad?"

The question assaulted Pleakley's brain and shorted out his ability to speak for a moment. He felt like one of his hearts had just dropped into the pit of his stomach. A very tense silence stretched for several seconds afterward, during which nobody seemed to want to intervene on Pleakley's behalf. Finally, Kirk volunteered an explanation.

"I'm afraid he hasn't known me long enough to decide whether he does or not. You see, I — I only just met my son for the first time this morning."

Lilo considered his answer. "Well, then, how can you be his dad if you've never met him before?"

"Well, I — " Kirk began, but was silenced by a discouraging look from Vay. Then Vay herself volunteered to explain.

"Lilo, let me ask you something. You know the story of the ugly duckling?"

"Of course! I have the book in my room! It's one of Stitch's favorites. I read it to him his first night here."

"Okay. Well, you know what happened when the ugly duckling first hatched from its egg?"

"He was all alone and scared."

"And it took him a while to find his parents, didn't it?"

"Yeah."

"And when he did, he didn't really feel like he belonged with them. Right?"

"Uh-huh."

"Well, it's sorta like that with Wendy and his dad."

"Oh." Lilo was silent a moment, then: "But the ugly duckling didn't belong, 'cuz the ducks weren't his parents. The swans were. But he didn't find them until later in the story."

"Oh, well, ummm, same thing. You know what I mean, right? It's just— kind of a hard thing to explain."

"I think I understand. But how come Pleakley's not happy about meeting his dad? The ugly duckling was happy when he found his parents, so how come he's not happy?"

Vay thought hard. "I suppose it's because he — he already knows where he belongs. He has friends and family who love him, so nothing was missing to begin with."

"I still think he should be happy," Lilo said matter-of-factly. She went up to Pleakley again, who was pretending to busy himself with the soufflé. She smiled widely at him, and he saw this from the corner of his eye and turned to look at her.

"I'm happy for you, Pleakley. Know why?" He answered her with a stare. "'Cuz now you've got even more ohana."

"Great," he grumbled, turning back to his soufflé. Lilo just kept grinning.

"Know what else?"

"What? No, wait. Don't tell me. Ohana means family, and family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten. Right?"

"Yep!"

Pleakley snorted. "Yeah. Right. Tell that to Mr. Sleazebag over there."

"Why?"

"Oh, I don't know." He swung around to face her. To face all of them. "Maybe because he LEFT me and my mom BEHIND and then FORGOT all about us!"

Lilo took a step backward in surprise at the sudden anger in his voice. Everyone in the kitchen: Vay, Leera, Gidgel, Kirk, Jumba, Stitch, and Lilo, all stared at him in shock.

"But… he came back, didn't he? He's here now, right?" the little girl asked timidly.

"Yeah, but where was he when we needed him? Huh?" Pleakley demanded, glaring over Lilo's head at Kirk as he said this. "Not that we ever actually did need him. But where in Blitznak was he when I was born prematurely and nearly died? Where was he when Mom had to sell herself just to make enough money to keep a roof over our heads? Where was he when I contracted the txacchioblerrus virus and nearly died again at the age of nine? Where was he when the Kaizaxx were torturing me just for the fun of it? Where was he then? Huh?"

At the end of his rant, Pleakley stopped to catch his breath. Kirk was as pale as a ghost, and everyone else was looking pretty much the same. As his words sank in, Lilo's face slowly worked its way into a frown.

"Well at least you have a dad! And a mom, too! If I were you I'd be really happy!" she shouted, her lip trembling.

Pleakley stared at her in shock. "Oh, Lilo…" he squeaked, reaching a hand out to her. Lilo bolted away from him, keeping a wide berth as she ran past the small crowd gathered in the kitchen and down the hallway to the elevator. Stitch ran after her, growling something unfavorable in Turian at Pleakley before disappearing around the corner. Lilo and Stitch sealed themselves inside their room and did not come down until Nani got home twenty minutes later and hollered for them to come down to dinner or starve. They both came down an hour late, ate twice as much spinach-and-pineapple soufflé as everyone else, and then acted as though the argument with Pleakley had never taken place.