They crowded to the sink to wash and Magda found a clean towel for them to dry their hands. She pulled the container of formula powder from the bag and started to prepare it, while Brian carried the cage to the couch and opened the lid.
‘Ashley, come and sit down,’ he said. ‘I’ll put Dexter on your lap so he can feel your warmth. He’s looking quite traumatised to me. We normally avoid cuddling joeys so they don’t get attached to humans, but sometimes they need comfort. And unfortunately he can’t be put with any other koalas for company until he’s been treated for chlamydia: he might infect them.’
Ashley sat down. Brian reached into the cage and gently lifted up the bundle of Dexter and his blanket and the teddy bear, and placed it all on Ashley’s lap.
Ashley pulled back the edge of the blanket and looked down at him. He was worse than he’d been that morning, she realised, with a sharp pang of worry. His eyes were dull and he seemed to have no energy. He didn’t even look at her, just sat still, blinking.
‘Hurry with that milk,’ Brian said softly to Magda. ‘This little fella’s losing ground.’
Magda bustled around in the kitchen for a few minutes and then came around the bench with a baby’s bottle of formula, which she handed to Brian.
‘Haven’t lost your touch,’ he said. He slowly brought the tip of the teat to Dexter’s mouth and squeezed so that a drop of milk appeared at the end.
Dexter took no notice.
Brian moved the bottle a little closer. ‘The first feed is vital. I hope we haven’t left it too long. If he’s stopped calling for food, he’s got very little chance of pulling through.’
Ashley willed Dexter to try the formula, but he sat completely still on her lap. If he wasn’t blinking, she’d have thought he was fast asleep.
She started to panic. It had been her idea to bring him all the way back here. Maybe they should have kept trying to find a carer near Currumbin. What if she’d been wrong? What if he didn’t survive?
She heard footsteps outside the door and the scuffling of boots being removed, and felt a wave of relief. Micky! Surely she would know what to do.
The door opened. Micky stepped inside and rested her walking stick against the wall. She smiled at Magda and went to speak, then caught sight of Ashley and Dexter on the sofa. The smile disappeared from her face. ‘What part of “no” didn’t you understand, Ashley?’ she said.
Brian blinked in surprise. ‘Huh?’
‘There was no one else to look after him,’ Ashley said to Micky, keeping her voice low. ‘They’d tried everyone. This was his only chance.’
‘I’m sorry, Micky,’ Brian said. ‘I was under the impression you’d agreed to having Dexter back.’
‘I did not agree,’ Micky said. ‘You know I don’t look after joeys any more. I can’t believe you didn’t check.’
Ashley knew it wasn’t fair for Brian and Magda to take the blame. ‘It’s my fault. I told them you’d said yes.’
Micky rolled her eyes, heaved a huge sigh and went around the bench. ‘Cup of tea,’ she muttered.
‘While you’re all arguing, that joey is looking terrible,’ Magda said.
Everyone’s gaze went to Dexter, who was drooping on Ashley’s lap.
Micky shrugged. ‘You shouldn’t have brought him all the way back. Has he taken food?’
‘Not yet,’ Brian said. ‘He had some SC fluids though.’
Micky said nothing, but started preparing chai. Dexter still ignored the bottle, though Brian waggled it a little to get his attention. Ashley’s heart pounded. It looked like Micky would just let Dexter die without doing anything.
‘Micky, please!’ she said, keeping her voice soft so she didn’t frighten Dexter. ‘I’ll look after him. I’ll do all the work. But you need to show me how, and you need to help us get him to eat.’
Micky carried on with boiling the kettle and pouring out the water as if Ashley hadn’t spoken. Brian sat back on his haunches, looking defeated. Dexter didn’t move.
‘Chai, Brian?’ Micky asked.
‘Sure,’ Brian said, and stood up. He’d given up, Ashley saw. Everyone had given up on Dexter except her.
‘Why are you being so cruel?’ Ashley asked Micky.
‘Now, Ashley —’ Brian said warningly.
‘But I want to know,’ Ashley persisted. ‘Dexter’s going to die if you don’t help. Why won’t you?’
Micky swung around. ‘You really want to know, kid? All right, I’ll tell you. My last batch was four joeys. I’d never had that many at once, but I thought, hey, how much extra work could it be? It was a lot extra. I was up day and night with those joeys. For six months I gave them everything. I got them out of the basket stage and up into the climbing frame. I got them out of the house and into the enclosure. They were almost ready for soft release. I thought it was a great achievement. I’d done it. I’d raised four joeys without losing any.’
She paused and stirred the tea. When she spoke again, her voice was tight. ‘In one week, all four of them died. One after the other. For no reason that I could see. There I was thinking what a great job I’d done, and it was all for nothing. I didn’t release a single joey. It was too painful. I couldn’t do it again.’
There was silence as Micky poured out the steaming chai. She didn’t look up. ‘Not that you’d understand, kid. You’re too young.’
Ashley flared with anger. If she didn’t have Dexter on her lap, she’d have leapt to her feet. ‘I am not too young,’ she snapped. ‘I just lost an animal too, remember? I couldn’t have Puppy after all. That was the whole reason I got sent up here.’
Micky gave a sad kind of smile. ‘A dog you saw on the internet and never even met?’ She looked around the room at all of them staring at her, and shrugged. ‘Anyway, that joey probably won’t make it. Look at him.’
Ashley looked down. It was true: Dexter looked terrible. ‘Oh well, let’s just let him die,’ she said. ‘Since you don’t want to feel sad again. I suppose that’s the most important thing.’
‘Whoa,’ Magda said.
Micky said nothing, just picked up a cup of chai and came around the bench. She handed it to Brian and then limped over to Ashley. She stood still for a moment, then knelt down and peered at Dexter.
Ashley held her breath. She hardly dared to hope that Micky was going to help. Then she saw Micky move her hand. She was holding a syringe full of something clear.
For a moment Ashley had no idea what Micky was going to do and she felt a rush of protectiveness. She drew back a little so that Dexter was further away from her aunt. There was no needle attached to the end of the syringe, but it still looked dangerous.
‘Relax, kid,’ Micky said. ‘If he’s not taking milk, I’ll try him with glucose and water. At least it will keep him hydrated till we get him feeding properly. He’s a bit old to be feeding during the day — he might be more receptive after dark.’
She put the nozzle at Dexter’s mouth and squeezed so that a few drops of clear liquid appeared and ran down his chin.
Dexter didn’t move, and Ashley’s hopes plummeted again.
‘Give him a little scratch behind the ear,’ Micky murmured to her. ‘Just softly. Let’s see if it wakes him up a bit.’
Ashley was almost too scared to do it. If that didn’t work, what would happen? But she raised her hand and slowly moved her fingers into Dexter’s fur.
It was warm and soft, in that kind of wiry koala way. She stroked him, then buried two fingers in his fur and rubbed gently behind his ears, keeping her movements slow.
At first, nothing happened. She kept going. And then she felt a shift under her fingers. Dexter was leaning in to her scratch, just a little.
‘That’s it,’ Micky whispered. ‘Come on, little mate. Keep scratching, Ash.’
Dexter moved again, raising his head. It looked as though he was sniffing.
‘That’s right, bubba,’ Micky murmured. ‘Come on. You’re hungry, aren’t you?’
Yip yip yip.
It was soft and weak, but it was a call for food. Dexter opened his mouth and let Micky slide the tip of the syringe inside. She squeezed it slowly and Ashley felt him start sucking. She didn’t dare speak, but she looked up and saw that Brian and Magda were smiling.
‘Well, it’s a start,’ Micky said.
‘You are a legend,’ Magda said.
‘So they tell me.’ Micky looked up at Ashley and winked.
Ashley couldn’t help a big smile spreading across her face. ‘A complete and total legend,’ she said to her aunt.
Chapter 19
Ashley and Micky sheltered on the step to wave goodbye to Brian and Magda. To Ashley’s surprise, Magda gave her a big hug.
‘You’re a very brave young woman,’ she said, squeezing her.
‘Not to mention a cheeky troublemaker,’ Micky said.
Brian laughed and gave Micky a kiss on the cheek. ‘You’re one to talk. Don’t give Ashley a hard time. You’d have done exactly the same thing.’
Micky crossed her arms and looked grumpy, but Ashley could see that the corners of her mouth were turned up in a little smile, and she relaxed. She’d been scared of getting into major trouble after Brian and Magda left, but it looked like it was going to be OK.
Brian patted her on the shoulder. ‘It was great to meet you, Ashley. Give your aunt hell.’
The two of them ran out into the rain and jumped into their car. The engine started with a soft purr, and they backed up, turned and disappeared down the driveway.
Micky and Ashley stood in silence for a moment. The howling wind of the night before had dropped off to almost nothing, Ashley realised. The rain was still falling in a light but steady shower, and she could hear the faint roar of the ocean in the distance. After the bright lights and stress of the wildlife hospital, it was peaceful. She was glad she’d brought Dexter back. This was his home.
They both stood looking around the garden, which was a mess of broken plants, fallen branches and ankle-deep drifts of leaves on the ground.
Ashley looked up at her aunt. ‘Thanks, Micky. I’m sorry about everything.’
Micky sighed. ‘You think the hard part’s over. Kid, it’s just started. Getting them across the river on the flying fox was nothing compared to what’s coming. We haven’t got Dexter drinking milk yet. Once he’s over that hurdle, you’ll be working all day keeping everything clean and getting food organised. Then forget about getting any sleep, because he’ll be up at night wanting to eat and thumping around making a racket. You’ll be working so hard on this holiday that you’ll wish you were back at school.’
Ashley shook her head. ‘No, I won’t. I was supposed to spend these holidays looking after a new puppy. I want to look after Dexter. I don’t mind working hard.’
‘He’s not a puppy. You can’t sit around cuddling him and playing with him, no matter how cute he seems. Got that?’
‘Yes.’
Micky looked at her shrewdly. ‘Have you really? You’re not looking after him because he’s so cute. Our job is to do everything possible to get him back to the wild. Often that’ll mean ignoring him. And that’s hard. Can you do it?’
Ashley wasn’t totally sure if she could, but she nodded anyway.
‘Good,’ Micky said. ‘We’d better get to work. We’ve got to set up a room inside for him with a climbing frame. He’s almost certainly infected with chlamydia, so he’ll need to be in quarantine while he has the antibiotics. We’ve got to weigh him and start the record-keeping. You’ll make up twenty-four hours’ worth of formula and I’ll show you how to sterilise everything and warm it up for feeding him. Lucky for you, I’ve collected some leaf, which will do him for tonight. It’s going to be dark soon, which means your shift is about to start.’
Ashley nodded again. ‘Sounds good.’
‘Plus, since you put one over on me, you’re going to help me get the garden repaired and any other jobs I need doing while you’re here. And you’re not going to complain, no matter how much of a slave driver I become.’
Looking around the garden, Ashley felt a little overwhelmed, but there was nothing she could do to back out now. ‘I guess we’d better get started.’
Micky put her hand on Ashley’s shoulder. ‘Kid, I have to warn you — he still could die.’
Ashley knew that warning had come way too late. She was already attached to Dexter. But she wasn’t going to let him die, no matter what Micky thought.
The Bright is disappearing and Youngster relaxes a little. He can open his eyes without blinking and look around him.
He is near a tree. It’s not a tree he knows, but at least the scent is familiar. He’s free to move, away from the bars that pressed on him.
He lets go of the furry thing he’s been clinging to and shifts himself around. He looks down and sees that at last he is away from the ground. It’s not far below, but it is a relief to be up. He’s not confined — he can climb. He wriggles out of the warmth and reaches up his claws. They touch bark, and he recalls his mother’s instruction. His claws sink into the bark and he pulls himself up.
It’s slow. He feels weak and groggy, but he manages to climb to the nearest fork in the tree and wedge himself into it. He stops to rest and looks around.
Everything is strange and Youngster is confused. Their home trees felt springy and alive; they released sharp smells when scratched. This tree feels dry under his claws, and it smells of nothing. It has no name. Dead trees usually have no leaves, but a spray of soft, fresh leaves springs from the next fork up.
The air is still. The wind, their constant companion — always whispering to them, always bringing new smells — has gone.
As the last of the Bright fades, he can see properly again. There is only a single tree. Perhaps his mother is higher up. Perhaps she has been waiting here for him. He must look for her.
He reaches out his claws again, grips the dead tree and pulls himself up. He climbs past the spray of leaves and further, higher, higher, until the branch suddenly stops. He clings, looking around. He calls for her, with a soft grunt.
She doesn’t answer.
He backs down, all the way to the first fork. When he reaches it, he realises that’s how she told him to come down, back when she was teaching him to climb. She would be proud of him.
He sets off again on another branch, climbs through the leaves, emerges from the top of them, finds the sudden end to the branch. He calls her again.
Four times he climbs to the sudden sharp end of a branch and calls her. Four times he backs down to the fork. There are no more branches. After the last descent he huddles there, not knowing what to do next.
He has never felt so alone in his life. She’s gone. It’s been so long since she held him, so long since she answered his cry, that she must be gone for good.
He shivers. His limbs feel heavy with exhaustion and he curls himself into a ball, squeezing his eyes shut.
He gives up. He cannot live without her.
Chapter 20
Ashley’s eyelids were drooping as she finished her dinner. The day seemed to have been going forever; she wanted nothing more than to fall into bed and sleep. Was it only the night before that the storm knocked the tree over and the water poured in under the door?
‘You can sleep down here again tonight,’ Micky said, taking her plate. ‘Though if it all goes well, you probably won’t get much sleep. Dexter should be waking up and feeling active at about eleven pm. When he calls for food, come and wake me and I’ll try to get him taking milk. You’ll learn how to do his feeds in the next couple of days, but these first few are vital and we can’t afford to get them wrong.’
‘Mmm.’ Ashley nodded.
Micky cocked her head to one side. ‘He’s very quiet now. Best to leave him alone if you can’t hear anything.’
‘But what if he’s in trouble?’
‘There’s not much you can do if he’s in trouble,’ Micky said. ‘If he’s going to die, he’s going to die.’
She
stooped over and gave Ashley a kiss on the top of the head. ‘You did well today, kid. I’m off to bed.’
Ashley watched her aunt climb up the second little stairway in the house. She was going up one step at a time, favouring her ankle. She didn’t complain about it, but it was obviously still hurting.
Ashley cleaned her teeth and got into her pyjamas. She checked the kitchen. Most of what she needed to feed Dexter was laid out, sterilised and ready, on the bench. She opened the drawer, looking for a spoon, and rummaged quietly.
Her fingers came to rest on something familiar and she pulled it out. It was her mobile phone! She’d wondered where Micky had hidden it.
She weighed it in her hand for a moment, then pressed the ‘on’ button. Nothing happened. It was still uncharged.
But she knew the charger was in her bag, down on the floor by the fire. Ashley hesitated. Her aunt had taken the phone from her. She wasn’t supposed to have it.
On the other hand, somehow she had to try to keep herself awake, and the best way to do that was to play games on her phone. She didn’t want to risk falling into such a heavy sleep that she didn’t hear Dexter calling for food.
She made up her mind. She took it over to her bag, pulled out the charger and found a power point where she could plug it in. It was a few minutes before the phone revived enough to flash the start-up symbol and begin checking for coverage.
Micky had told her that mobile reception was hopeless at Toad Hall, and Ashley wondered if she’d have any at all. She watched the little picture of the antenna as it scanned. It took ages, but finally a single bar of reception showed.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Messages started popping up on the screen and Ashley quickly switched the phone to silent. When it stopped vibrating, she began to flick through them.
Emma had sent twelve messages, she saw, and most of them contained photos. Ashley wondered if they were all photos of Emma with Bella. She really wasn’t sure she wanted to see them, but she was too curious to resist. She flicked to the first message.
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