In the meantime Chloe discovered that her friend Sarah’s mother, Mrs Johnson, was the wildlife carer looking after the joey whose mother had been killed by the school bus that day. He was such a cute little joey, full of spirit and life. Nobody could think of a good name for him, so they just called him ‘Joey.’
Chloe would go over after school to visit Joey. He was so sweet, adorable and gentle! Chloe held the bottle so Joey could drink his special milk and get strong. She touched his greyish-brown fur. It was so soft and silky and made her smile. Joey would look deeply into her eyes with his big black eyes and she felt that he loved and trusted her. He suckled noisily on the warm milk, closed his eyes and fell asleep. She put him in his special pouch hanging on the wall and gave him a little kiss on his face.
His fur smelled like a mixture of freshly mown grass and the smell of her dog’s fur after it was washed.
“Did you know that Australia kills millions of kangaroos every year, Chloe?” asked Mrs Johnson.
Chloe was shocked. It was bad enough to have seen Joey’s mother killed by the bus but the fact that millions of them were killed deliberately was hard for her to understand.
“But why?” Chloe had a very pain-filled expression on her face and felt as though she was going to cry.
“Many people who live on farms with cows, sheep and horses don’t like them and kill them if they hop onto their property. And millions are killed to make dog food. Some people even like to eat kangaroo meat.”
Chloe gasped ….
“In fact, it’s the biggest slaughter of land-based wild animals on the planet. They are now killing kangaroos not much bigger than Joey because so many of the biggest kangaroos, especially fathers and grandfathers, have already been wiped out. Do you feed your dog kangaroo mince?”
“Oh no, Peppe eats dry biscuits and lots of leftovers from what we eat” replied Chloe.
“That’s good” said Mrs Johnson. “I’m wondering though how we can help the rest of Joey’s family. They will all die unless they are moved to somewhere safe soon.”
Chloe had been thinking the same thing herself. How could she help Joey’s other family so they didn’t have to lose their joeys and mothers and fathers?
She started to talk to Joey in private and to her surprise he talked back. It wasn’t the normal language that people use with each other but rather what Chloe thought of as feelings from deep inside his heart.
She would look at him, ask him a question, wait quietly without thinking and then she could feel what he was thinking. Joey and Chloe were able to talk about anything and they had wonderful conversations. Joey would tell Chloe about all the things he loved in his life and also the things he was scared of. Chloe would then tell Joey the same things about her life. Sometimes she spoke out loud and sometimes she just whispered very quietly.
She decided not to tell anyone about these conversations because she was afraid that people would laugh and say she was imagining it.
It was just going to be her secret. Little did she know there was an even bigger secret to come.