CHAPTER TWO — The Giant Who Needed a Boss
In our village, children believed Varghese could lift anything.
A fridge, a motorcycle, three sacks of rice at once—these were facts to us because every older cousin had seen him do it “with their own eyes.” If you lined up ten men from the village, Varghese would tower over nine of them and apologize to the tenth for blocking the sun.
But inside that giant chest lived a small, nervous bird.
He was a man who checked shadows twice and noises thrice.
He hated sleeping alone.
He hated walking in the dark.
He hated being the first to enter any room.
And he always—always—needed a boss.
Rosily Chechi, the Real Power
Rosily Chechi wasn’t tall.
She wasn’t loud.
But she carried the household like a crane carries steel beams—steady, unshaking, precise.
If Varghese was the giant of muscle, she was the giant of everything else.
She knew when the children needed school books, when the roof leaked again, when the coconut trees were due for pruning, when the ration shop would reduce rice quantity, when the water bill was overdue.
She also knew when Varghese’s fears were rising—the way he would look at the ceiling fan as though it might fall, or check the front door latch for the third time in ten minutes.
“Varghese, go sleep,” she would say.
And like a soldier receiving orders, the giant obeyed.
A good woman, the elders said.
A patient woman, the women said.
A miracle worker, the men said.
Because living with a giant is easy.
Managing his fears is not.
The Night It Happened
It was a Thursday.
Rosily Chechi had fallen asleep early after a fever.
Varghese lay beside her, wide awake, listening to the fan click inconsistently—the kind of clicking that made him imagine the blade detaching and flying across the room.
At some point, between the eighth and ninth click, he heard a different noise.
A footstep.
Then another.
Not heavy.
Not hurried.
Just careful.
He held his breath.
The door creaked faintly.
A silhouette slipped in—tall and lean, a shape the village didn’t have many of.
His mind whispered the name instantly.
Kuttan.
Varghese’s heart thudded against his ribs.
He wanted to sit up.
He wanted to shout.
But fear glued him to the bed like a child hiding under his blanket during a storm.
So the giant closed his eyes tightly and pretended to sleep.
He heard cloth moving.
Cupboards opening.
A whispered curse.
Something metallic clinking.
The faintest thud of a box being lifted.
His life savings.
Rosily’s gold.
A decade of Gulf sweat.
Taken.
All he could do was breathe silently, praying the thief wouldn’t look at him long enough to see the truth:
that the giant of our village was terrified.
The shadow left.
The door clicked shut.
Varghese opened his eyes, but even the darkness felt like it was staring back at him.
He didn’t wake Rosily Chechi that night.
What would he say?
That the jungle’s strongest tiger had been too scared to roar?
The Slow Boiling of Shame
The next morning, Rosily found the cupboard open.
Within minutes, the house burst into noise—her family, neighbors, the curious, the bored.
“Gold is gone!”
“Cash too!”
“God help them!”
“How did the thief enter?”
“Varghese didn’t hear anything?!”
Varghese sat silently in the corner, shrinking with every question.
He could feel people expecting him to be angry, to shout, to break something.
But shame has a way of making even giants small.
Only Rosily Chechi noticed the tremor in his fingers.
She didn’t ask.
Not then.
But that evening, after everyone left, she sat next to him.
“Varghese… what do you know?”
The bird inside his chest fluttered.
He looked down.
His voice came out small.
“I think… I think it was Kuttan.”
She didn’t gasp.
She didn’t scold.
She simply placed her hand on his.
“Then we will handle it,” she said.
Because that’s what she did—handled things.
The Kidnapping of Kuttan
A few weeks later, after quietly gathering whispers and suspicion, Varghese made a decision he wouldn’t have dared make alone.
But this time, he had Rosily’s permission.
He gathered four friends—men who loved drama more than stability.
They waited for Kuttan Chettan near the abandoned bus shelter at dusk.
No one knows the exact details, only the dramatic versions that grew over the years. But this much is true:
They grabbed him.
Pushed him into a jeep.
Drove to the fields.
Asked him questions.
Loudly.
At some point between the fear, the threats, and the truth cornering him like a wild dog, Kuttan broke.
He confessed.
He told them where the money had gone, where the gold was hidden, what he had done.
Varghese listened, fists trembling—not with rage, but with the memory of that night when he pretended sleep and let a thief steal his courage.
“Why, da?” he asked, his voice cracking.
Kuttan didn’t have an answer that made sense.
Desperation rarely translates well
Police, Heroes, and Half-Truths
The next morning, Varghese and his friends marched Kuttan to the police station.
The officers were furious.
“You fools! Kidnapping is OUR job!”
“Who do you think you are?”
“This is illegal!”
But even in their anger, there was relief.
The case was solved.
No investigation needed.
No paperwork beyond the usual.
By afternoon, the news spread.
Varghese had caught the thief.
Recovered his family’s honor.
Shown courage.
Saved the neighborhood.
A giant, after all.
Exactly the story the village preferred.
No one mentioned the fear.
No one mentioned the night he pretended to sleep.
No one mentioned the trembling hands.
Why ruin a hero?
Sometimes heroes are built not from truth, but from what the village needs to believe.
And for the first time in his life, Varghese stood a little taller—not because he was strong, but because for once, he didn’t feel alone.
Rosily Chechi stood behind him, arms folded, expression unreadable.
A giant needs a boss.
And he had the best one.
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