Lili was collecting acorns on her way home from school, pausing beneath the oak trees to search out the best specimens, when she remembered that today was Tuesday. Lili couldn't be late home on Tuesdays because on Tuesdays she had dance class in the evening! Lili shoved the acorns which she had picked up into the pockets of her cargo pants and sprinted the last two blocks home, certain that she would face her mother's wrath when she arrived for dawdling on the way.
As Lili approached her house, she spotted the grey stray cat which had decided to adopt her family staring intently at the space beneath their front porch. The cat had its hackles up and was hissing and spitting at something beneath the porch.
Of course, Lili was already late, but she knew that baby skunks had been living under her porch. Were they big enough yet to spray? Lili didn't know, but she sure didn't want to find out by having the skunks spray at the grey cat and stink up her whole house (not to mention the cat)! Slowly and cautiously, Lili approached the cat.
"Come here kitty. Come away from there," Lili said.
The cat ignored Lili, however, and continued to hiss at whatever was bothering it under the porch.
"Come on cat. You'll get us both sprayed," Lili warned, but the cat still paid her no heed.
"It's just the baby skunks," Lili told the cat, but she was no longer so sure of that. The cat and the skunks had never bothered each other in the past, but something under the porch was definitely upsetting the cat now. Unable to draw the cat's attention away from whatever was troubling it, Lili finally got down on her hands and knees and peered beneath the porch herself.
