The familiar chime of Tenafly High School’s bell rang as the clock struck 3:11 p.m. on Monday afternoon. Right on cue, students began to pour out of the exits, pent-up chatter filling the hallways as teachers breathed sighs of relief after a hectic first-day back from break.
While some students waited for their parents to pick them up after school, others began the familiar walk across the pathway to the middle school. I had just crossed the street, an AirPod in one ear, when a sharp voice cut through the noise: “Look, it’s a dead bat!” A small crowd began to form at the entrance of the bridge, students leaning in and pointing toward the sidewalk. Pushing my way closer, I caught sight of the animal—a small, dark figure lying motionless on the concrete, its tiny chest rapidly rising and falling as it fought for breath.
For a few minutes, no one moved. Students murmured as they exchanged uncertain glances, torn between an urge to help and a fear of the bat. From the edge of the crowd, Chloe Hong (’26) and a boy stepped forward, kneeling beside the bat and carefully examining it.
Chloe unraveled her navy scarf from her neck, reaching out with her thick gloves to take the bat, hesitating a moment in caution. The boy took the gloves and gently lowered the scarf around the animal, the dark fabric serving as a warm barrier between fragile wings and the concrete below. The bat let out a loud cry, its voice cutting through the cold air to reveal a pink tongue and sharp teeth.
“The bat looked so small and adorable, and who knows if it was injured or not…I couldn’t just leave the animal in need behind, so I had to stay,” Hong explained. With a collective gasp from the onlookers, the two lifted the bat from the sidewalk and cradled it as Chloe took the animal away from harm’s path.
After the bat was secure in her arms, attention shifted to finding professional help. Remley Brumby (’28) pulled out her phone to contact animal control. “It was alive and it needed immediate help,” Brumby said. “If we just left the bat there, numerous things could’ve happened to it.”
For almost half an hour, Chloe and her twin sister, Ashley Hong (’26) stood, waiting for animal control services. Despite the promise of twenty minute arrival time, there was no assistance in sight.
Freshmen Aditi Jayram and Emma Krav had just finished their homework before seeing the sisters. “We thought she dropped something, so we stopped and asked if she was all right, and she showed us the bat,” Jayram said. Offering to take the bat, the pair walked from the high school to the Tenafly Veterinary Center.
Upon arrival, the veterinarians quickly identified it as a baby fruit bat, and remained cautious as they explained the situation to the freshmen: due to the potential danger of rabies, they weren’t able to keep or treat the bat, instead calling animal control.
“Don’t just ignore animals,” Krav said. Despite having no prior knowledge or experience with bats, their encounter served as a reminder that the simple decision to act matters far more than certainty in knowing what to do.
