(scape)goat

by Priyanuj Mazumdar

It’s October, but the sun glares at me with the over-confidence of a summer day. A hundred odd people breathe contaminated air, chests surging and falling in unison. In front of the red-bricked community temple, something dreadful is about to happen. I want to look away, but I can’t. I haven’t been able to for a decade now.

The rope around the goat’s neck moves frantically, desperately, violently—one last exhibition of its sentience. The protest goes unheard. Unlike me, the poor baby refuses to keep quiet, bleating for one last shot at life. I try swallowing the guilt—but choke, coughing like a coward. The pujari, adorned in just a red dhoti, raises his dagger, and waits mid-air—like he’s about to deliver a record-breaking throw. His red tilak, smudged by sweat, makes his forehead look bloody, his heavy breathing pushing his potbelly like a pregnant woman. Except he is taking a life away.

Animal sacrifice is a tradition I have shamefully observed for the last ten years of my life. Tradition is a cute word my people use for unpunishable crimes. Goats, buffaloes, chickens—it doesn’t matter what kind. A black goat, a white buffalo, a brown rooster—it doesn’t matter what color. They would be soaked in red anyway. My father tells me the goddess’ vengeance needs to be satisfied against the buffalo demon. Buffalo demon? Seriously? There’s only one form demons take in this world, and that is the human form. But every Durga Puja, without fail, I find myself here—a quiet witness to a crime.

Sweat. Under my arms. Sweat. Down inside my sandals. Sweat trickling down my thighs like tap water from a leaky faucet. And wind? Forget about it. Gnawing at my bones, the stuffy weather permeates my body. Yet I stand here—at the same place I have wanted to run away from all my life. The frame of the pujari blends with the temple background—a vast red structure. The dagger hangs in the air for ever. A deafening thud. Then a drop of blood, splat against my right cheek, dripping slowly and mixing with my sweat like poison. Red blood. Malicious blood. Futile blood. I want to throw up.

I run. Pushing against the sweaty crowd. Immovable statues. Maybe I should puke on their fucking shirts. Hot, like keeping your face close to a pressure cooker. And then relief. Gentle breeze. The crowd behind me now. I sit down on a giant boulder right across the temple. I feel chilly, but my body is on fire. Don’t think about the goat’s face, don’t think about the goat’s face. I think about the goat’s face—a muted resignation. Like mine. I remember the first time—my father thought it would be fun for a fourteen-year-old to watch a buffalo get slaughtered. I came back home traumatized, screaming at him, crying alone. But the very next year, I asked my cousin brother to take me to the same spot—different animal, same crime. That repeated every year, sometimes with my cousins, sometimes with friends, most times alone. Like today. Every visit was colored with the same guilt—like I was committing a crime myself. Being an accessory to a crime is still a crime after all.

Sweating like I am on the slaughter myself—I bury my head on my lap, grinding my teeth, a splitting headache hitting me, silently screaming for all of this to end.

“Mrinal, is that you?”

A lanky figure stands in front of me, hands on hips, leaning slightly. “Ali?” I say, whisper rather. When you haven’t seen someone for a long time, your brain starts erasing their face, bit by bit—until they fade into one of the billions you don’t recognize in this world. Not Ali.

“Ki khobor? How have you been?” In a white kurta, he looks taller, plumper, and more handsome than the last time I saw him. “Oh god, it’s been—it’s been a long time, no? I haven’t seen you since—I mean, the last time I saw you was, you know.” Yes, I remember the last time we met, Ali. I haven’t forgotten it for a day.

“I guess—wait, what did you ask?”

Ali smiles and sits beside me on an adjacent boulder. “You look—different,” he says.

“Is that a polite way of saying ugly?”

“No, no. I was going to say that you look good but thought that might come off as a bit creepy. You have grown your hair—it looks nice. It suits you.”

“Thanks.”

“I haven’t seen you around.”

“Yeah, I moved to Mumbai last year.”

“Mumbai, big city man! I always knew you would do big things.” Ali beams. Maybe it’s the fury of what I have just witnessed, the mental breakdown that I am still in the middle of, or the bitterness of what happened the last time we met, but I sense a slight condescension in his voice. I don’t like that. “So, you home for the holidays?”

“Yeah. I wasn’t planning on coming,” I say truthfully, “but had some stuff to pick up and wanted to spend time with Ma,” and then lie out of my teeth. I’m in no mood for honest discourse.

“I thought I saw you there,” Ali says.

“Where?”

 “There.” He points at the dispersing crowd I was standing with moments ago—the crime scene. I freeze as more sweat clouds my temples. “And then I thought I must be hallucinating. I still feel like I am.” He laughs. Why do you care now, Ali? Acting like I didn’t chase you around desperately for years—pleading, begging for you to say something, anything—only for you to desert me. “Why you so nervous, man? All good?” Ali taps my back, once, twice, and then withdraws quickly—as if he’s touched something he’s not supposed to. He turns around, staring intently at the people in front of the temple.

“Looks like you are the nervous one. You okay?” I say.

“Yeah, yeah,” Ali takes out a handkerchief and rubs his forehead. “It’s quite a spectacle, no?”

“What?”

“This whole thing.” He talks about it like a concert, movie premiere, a cricket match—something joyous.

“Sure,” I say. I have no energy to argue, let alone with someone I haven’t talked to for years now. Someone who’s caused me pain—such fresh, visceral pain. My anger at the sacrifice of the goat, my anger at the people that cheer and keep the tradition alive, my anger at my own role in that—they can wait. I don’t want to talk to Ali. Not now, not ever.

The sun has started to hide behind clouds—grey clouds—emerging, looming over our heads. It will be dark soon. A group of men, all in white kurtas, walk by us. Ali steals a look, and then half-covers his face with his hands.

“What happened?”

“Nothing,” Ali says, skittish and tense again. I stare at him. “What? I just thought I saw someone I know.”

“So?”

“Nothing. Okay tell me, are you studying or working now?” Ali changes the subject.

“Working. Corporate. At this MNC.”

“How is that?”

“It’s good.” He stares at me like that’s not good enough. “It’s good money but gets really boring sometimes. It’s the same shit every day, you know? It gets to a point where I question myself—isn’t doing the same thing every day and expecting different results the definition of madness?” This is the first time I’m verbalizing my dissatisfaction with my work. What the hell—I am supposed to keep my mouth shut, not spill my guts.

“But the money is good, right?” he says, as if he didn’t hear anything else.

“Yeah—yeah, I guess. But I’m looking for something better, something that gets me excited in the morning, you know.”

“Having a steady paycheck would get me excited in the morning.”

“Yeah, sure, but there are more important things than money, right?”

Ali becomes quiet, looking away into the distance, at the old market. Crowds have started gathering, mostly around the mobile food stalls. The permanent shops are less occupied, looking the same time as they did a decade ago—small and tin-roofed—but older, more dilapidated, nameplates discolored. Time hasn’t been kind to this town and its people. Except to Ali, it seems.

There’s a chill settling in—the night starting to seep into the veins of the streets, streetlights illuminating the town like it’s Diwali. The question still hangs in the air, unanswerable now.

“Aren’t you going to eat?” Ali says, getting up.

“What?”

“The mutton, of course. Didn’t you see everyone going in? I heard it’s heavenly. Go eat before it’s over.” The temple prepares a grand meal every year, prepared by and for the people in the community. I have relished several of those meals, but today, my appetite is as quiet as my conscience has been all these years.

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

“I feel like puking even thinking about eating—” I can’t get myself to say mutton or gosht or the several other names human beings have assigned to dead animals. That goat was alive in front of me—eating it would be like eating someone I know.

“Oh, you don’t eat meat anymore?”

“I do, but—”

“Do you eat chicken?”

“Yeah.”

“Pork?”

“Yeah.”

“Just not mutton?”

“What’s your point?” Ali smiles. Fuck you and fuck that coy smile.

“Anyway, leave it. Someone told me that last year’s mutton was better. It was a much larger goat. Fattier, juicier—”

“What a fucking stupid thing to say.”

“I am sorry?”

“Are you for fucking real? An animal was murdered right in front of you, and all you care about is the quality of the meat. Are you that insensitive?”

“I didn’t mean it like that. I was just trying to—” Ali stops mid-sentence, and his voice changes from considerate to accusatory. “Wait, how long has it been since you stopped eating mutton? Because I remember it being your favorite meat, right? And weren’t you in the crowd today too? Why did you come to see the goat get slaughtered, then?”

“I—”

“Right. You haven’t come down your high horse yet, I see. Don’t you get tired? Don’t you want to get down sometimes and see what shit is like in real life?”

“What the fuck are you talking about man?” I square up to Ali, our faces close. “How can you be okay with this stuff? Innocent animals being sacrificed—as an offering to appease God? That’s some fucked up justification.”

“So now you have a problem with God?”

“No, I just have a problem with God being used to make scapegoats out of animals.”

“Okay, tell me something. Your religion forbids eating beef. My religion forbids eating pork. Which one is right?” Although it’s dark, Ali’s face is visible—red, resigned, agonized. “You’re the same as the last time I remember you. Fuck this, man! This was a mistake.” He sighs, starting to walk away.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I grab his shoulder and pull him towards me. He shoves me as I trip, falling to the ground. Two young girls, both wearing colorful frocks, stare at me. They cover their faces, but laughter erupts a few seconds later as they hurriedly walk away. My face blazes with humiliation.

“Don’t fucking do that again,” Ali says. “You act like you care about things. But you always do what you want and people around you suffer the consequences.”

“What are you talking about? Is it—is it about what happened on your birthday? Because if I remember, I didn’t do anything you didn’t want to, okay? Why am I even explaining myself? You were the one who decided you didn’t want me in your life anymore.” I get up and wipe the dust off my hands. A thin, reddish-brown line of blood runs under my nail. I press against it.

“Have you ever wondered why?” Ali screams at me.

“Yes, because I kissed you.”

Ali scoffs, his mouth gaping in bewilderment. “No, you dumbfuck. To save you.”

“What? What? That’s the biggest pile of dogshit I have ever heard. I remember it clearly. We were at the back of your house, right in that corner between the bathroom and the storeroom, and I kissed you. Shafqat Amanat Ali’s Bin Tere was playing, my brain was melting, and my chest was thumping from the realization that our friendship would never be the same again. And oh boy, was I right!”

“But what happened after the kiss?”

“What do you mean what happened? We both know what happened. Your abbu saw us and we ran for our lives.”

“I remember that you fool. But when I had to eventually come home, there was no birthday party left—it had turned into a funeral. Abbu jaan and ammi jaan were waiting at the entrance ready to chop my neck. That’s not all, Uncle Mohsin was there too.”

I gulped. “I—I didn’t know that.” Growing up, my mother used stories of Uncle Mohsin terrorizing the entire town as bait to make me eat my vegetables. I still don’t know how much of that is true, how much legend, but just hearing his name gives me PTSD.

“How would you? He made me swear I would never meet you again, and if I did—”

“If you did, what?”

“Uncle Mohsin was always nice to me. I know that sounds like a lie. But he was, he really was. Not that day, though. His eyes were so red I had to blink twice to make sure I wasn’t in one of my nightmares. He told me that there will be people keeping an eye on me every moment—and if they ever saw me with you or going to your house, he would,” Ali gulps, as if relieving the trauma again, “cut you and your family into pieces and throw them in the Brahmaputra River. He never liked the fact that I had a Hindu friend, but the chill that his words sent down my spine that day still makes me shiver at night sometimes.”

“Wait, is that why you were so nervous earlier? You thought one of Uncle Mohsin’s men were watching you?”

“Yeah.”

I can’t believe what I am hearing. I want to say a million things to Ali. I’m sorry for believing that you hated me. I’m sorry for believing that you wanted me out of your life. I’m sorry for believing that you were a homophobic asshole. I’m sorry for giving up on us. But I only manage a pathetic “I don’t know what to say.”

“I lost a lot that day, a lot more than I bargained for. I lost respect for Uncle Mohsin, I lost you—the only person who ever understood me.” He looks at me and smirks. “But nothing, nothing hurt me more than seeing ammi jaan wipe away her tears every time I would walk into the kitchen for days after. That still—” His lips quiver and his voice cracks “—fucking haunts me! I never want to see her cry—ever, ever! You get it?” He points at me, then places his finger on my chest, poking. “I couldn’t in good conscience be friends with you anymore. Figuring out my sexuality isn’t more important than mending my relationship with my mother.”

“I understand,” I say meekly.

“I don’t know if you remember this but that was also the beginning of all these Hindu-Muslim conflicts. It’s insane how that’s become a fabric of this town now.” I shake my head furiously. Until then, religion was invisible here—parents didn’t care if their kids were at a Hindu’s place or a Muslim’s place and communal violence could only be found in our history textbooks. “One particular day, I heard Uncle Mohsin talking to abbu jaan that this Hindu shopkeeper had refused to sell mutton to a Muslim schoolteacher and they were going to confront the shopkeeper. I saw terror in abbu’s eyes—he knew something horrifying was going to happen. That was the first day in a long time I wanted to talk to you. But after a few days, I received this bag of money. You remember that shit?”

“I—I had heard that your abbu’s business had shut down and just wanted to help.”

Ali chuckles, then howls with laughter. “You just don’t get it sometimes, do you?”

“Don’t get what?”

“That just because we are poor, doesn’t mean we need your pocket change.” Ali’s voice cracks, rendering me speechless once more. My brain has finally shut down. There’s nothing to be said, nothing to be done. It’s time to go home, bury my face in the pillow, hold my breath and hope I run out of oxygen.

“Let’s walk,” he says. I don’t question Ali as we stroll towards the market. People take turns from stuffing their faces with chicken pakoras to stare at us—talking in hushed voices as if we were the town gossip.

“Why is everyone looking at us?” I say. We stop in front of a shop with a white board and bold-red letters: Ali’s Mutton. What? No. I feel weak, too dizzy to stand, my legs screaming for rest. This can’t be. This fucking can’t be.

*****

We sit close to each other on the lone bench inside Ali’s shop as a young boy, barely a teenager, serves us red tea. I take a sip as the hot ginger-infused liquid hits my patchy throat like fire and activates growling noises in my stomach. I haven’t eaten all day.

“I can’t believe I was so angry at you for so long,” I say.

“I can’t believe you were so obsessed with me,” Ali says, giggling.

“You know I would pass by your house almost every evening for months. First in the hope of seeing you, and then just in the hope of remembering how life was like before. And on days I would miss you too much, I would wait in front of your house for a minute or two. All the times we spent together in that house would flash before me.”

“That is the sweetest thing I have ever heard. I’m so sorry,” Ali says, taking a deep breath and lighting a cigarette. “Okay, there’s one question that’s eating me up,” he says after a brief pause, turning to me. Our faces are inches apart again. His lips are the same as I last remember them—small, rosy pink, a tiny cut on his upper lip. “We used to come see the animal sacrifice every Durga Puja, right? But you hate seeing animals killed, clearly.” I snicker, spitting a few droplets of tea. “Yet you voluntarily came to watch it today?”

There goes Ali with the biting questions. If there’s one thing I haven’t missed about him all these years, it’s having to be self-aware all the fucking time. I ask him for the cigarette and take a long puff. “I don’t know. Every year, I am disgusted—first with other people and then with myself. And every time, I vow to never return. But when Durga Puja is around the corner, I start feeling this anxiety, which quickly descends into a physical desperation—almost like a drug addict experiencing withdrawal. I crave for another dose. I know, I know how fucked up that sounds.”

“So you come here every year?”

I shrug. I don’t want Ali to think I am irretrievably deranged. “I have been seeing a therapist. Hopefully she can help me see why I do this and how I can stop.” Ali purses his lips, then nods slowly. “I have tried so hard, so fucking hard to figure out what the hell’s wrong with me.” My voice breaks into an ugly whimper. “But I can’t, I can’t figure it out.”

“Hey, it’s okay.” Ali takes the cigarette from me and holds my hand, rubbing his thumb along my palm like he used to. I stare into his hazel eyes, and it’s like no time has passed between us. “Your departure really destroyed me, you know. Ever since then, I haven’t been sane.”

“So it’s all my fault, then?” he says playfully, softly blowing smoke into my face, his lips almost on mine. I freeze. A group of men walk past Ali’s shop, looking at us the whole way. I move away from Ali.

“How long have you had this shop?”

“Five years now. After abbu jaan’s business collapsed, I tried my hands at a number of things. God, I don’t even want to get into that.” He lets go off my hand and grabs his tea, slurping slowly. “This mutton shop was the only one that allowed a stable income. It didn’t pay a whole lot, but we had food at the table at the end of every day. I had no time to think if this was something I wanted to do or not. I just had to. It’s a temporary thing of course.” I nod in encouragement. “Sometimes,” he says, “we have to choose between someone else’s life and our own. I don’t like the idea that my living comes at the expense of someone’s death. It’s a tough choice, but I have to make it every day.”

Before I can grasp the startling grimness of Ali’s words, he throws the cigarette butt to the ground, stomps on it, and continues. “That day, this little kid comes up to me and asks for mutton. When I ask him how much, he says he doesn’t have any money. So I tell him to go back home and get the money first. But I find out he has no money to give—his entire family is out of work. Me handing him that mutton for free would be the difference between his family sleeping on an empty stomach or not. People are struggling really hard, Mrinal. Religion asks us to abide by so many rules—eat this food, but don’t eat this food; wear this, but don’t wear this; love this person, but don’t love this person. Do you really think everyone enjoys that privilege? If someone is dying of hunger, do you really think they would give a shit what they eat?”

Fuck, I have missed you so much, Ali. A loud bang makes us jump out of our seats. A group of testosterone-fuelled frames of varying ages stand before us with heavy bamboo sticks. “Look at him, sipping his tea like a nawab!” The guy closest to us—the leader I assume, taunts Ali aggressively. These are the same people I saw passing by us moments ago.

“You’re dead, kela! You understand?” Another one says. He signals to two of the youngest men in the group, technically boys, and they walk towards us. They smash the ceramic cups of tea into the ground and start thrashing the iron table, forming small dents with each hit. The leader grabs Ali by the shirt and drags him out of the shop, shouting “you bloody mullah, you were selling beef again?” along the way. The crowd from the food stalls start gathering in front of Ali’s shop like an army of ants marching towards a grain of sugar. Nothing entertains people here like a public fight.

“No, no, Rana da.” Ali’s voice is fearful but earnest. “I swear I didn’t.”

“Chup, you motherfucker! My boys saw you sell beef to multiple people. You have no shame? Didn’t we make it clear the last time that this is a Hindu area—you can’t sell beef here.”

“Ra—Rana da, but there are Muslim people in the area too and they keep asking me for beef. Etia if customers are demanding, I can’t say no, right? I’m also running a business.”

“You will teach me about business? That’s the problem,” Rana says, like he’s made a startling discovery. “You people are growing balls bigger than your brains. How dare you—” Before Rana could finish his sentence, Ali shoves him and takes off, pushing through the crowd, disappearing from our sight in seconds. I try to scream at Ali but my mouth remains open—speechless, soundless. “What are you looking at, you fools? Catch him!” Rana snarls at the group as they chase Ali. I run behind testosterone gang too, kicking my dead legs into action. The crowd behind us whistle and applaud like it’s a scene from a Bollywood action movie.

I don’t know how long we’ve been running but soon, the goons take a sharp right and stop abruptly. We are in front of the temple again. The men surround Ali, thrusting him against a pillar, holding out his hands horizontally and twisting them to his back—rendering him immobile. One of them chokeholds Ali as he tries to move his neck frantically, desperately, violently. The protest goes unheard. The same two boys who led the table destruction land punches on his face.

Ali keeps quiet, but I fail to. I dash past the remaining men, screaming. I am this close to where Ali stands, extending my hand to reach him. Just as I feel his face, an arm dangles out and lands smack on my stomach. I fumble to the ground, my face hitting the dust, grains of dirty sand on my tongue. I spit out the sand, press against the ground and get up slowly, dusting off my hands. There’s blood on my hands. I look at Ali’s face—half-red, fresh cuts spread out like face tattoos, his once rosy lips maroon—blood dripping from multiple places. Red blood. Malicious blood. Futile blood. I want to throw up.

“Walk home or we will beat you up like this mullah too, you get it?” Rana growls at me. “Stay out of the fucking way.” He picks me up and grabs me by my throat with one hand as I cough like a coward. “You are Makani baideu’s son, aren’t you? If you tell anyone about this, we’ll turn up at your house nice and early tomorrow morning and give you the same treatment in front of your mother, you get it?”

Before I can say anything, Ali yells at me, his voice cracking. “Go, Mrinal, go.”

Four of the goons square up to me as I take a few steps back. The rest continue kicking and punching Ali. Your body is a temple, the Bible says, and for a moment, Ali blends with the temple behind him. I tighten my fist and clench my teeth, shaking uncontrollably. My blood isn’t boiling, it’s steaming. One of the goons turns me around and pushes me. I take one final look and exit the crime scene, leaving the victim and criminals behind, crying my heart out.

A group of barbaric savages decide to commit crimes and Ali pays with his blood. Like the goat, he’s another scapegoat. Screams, terrifying screams, repeated screams of if you ever think about selling beef again, you are dead meat and I promise I won’t, please let me go echo in my ears long after I have left.

*****

It’s close to midnight by the time I reach home. My tears have dried out, but Ali’s bloodied, disgruntled face feed on my brain like parasites, pricking against my skull, accentuating my headache, invading my conscience.

“Where were you?” Ma asks as I close the door behind me.

“Huh?”

“I made dinner. Let me heat it up.”

“I don’t feel like eating.”

“I made mutton, your favorite.” Just as her words leave her mouth, I rush to the sink, nausea in my throat and hunger pangs in my stomach, staring at the mirror above until Ma calls me again. I sit down, pick up a piece of mutton, slathered in thick gravy, falling off the bones, hanging in the air like the pujari’s dagger. “Eat,” my mother says sternly. I put the mutton in my mouth, fingers dripping, tears streaming down, infiltrating my mouth, making the meat taste saltier than usual.

Photo of Priyanuj Mazumdar

BIO: Priyanuj Mazumdar is a writer and editor from northeast India whose work has appeared or is forthcoming in the Los Angeles Review, Southern Review of Books, Harbor Review, Allium, and elsewhere. He received the Nadine B. Andreas Endowment for 2025-26 and was shortlisted for the Leopold Bloom Prize for Innovative Narration. An MFA candidate at Minnesota State University, Mankato, he edits fiction for Iron Horse and Blue Earth Review.