The village of Monteverde was carved into the earth like a forgotten prayer — stone cottages, cracked wells, and dirt paths veined with the footprints of men chasing nothing. There, in a modest home that smelled of wood smoke and quiet sorrow, Enzo Marino was born on a winter night. The midwife declared him healthy, his cries loud, his fists clenched — a boy already fighting the cold world that waited outside.
He was the middle child of five, the one no one celebrated or spoiled. His elder brother, Antonio, was meant to inherit whatever name the family carried. The youngest, Luca, was coddled and doted on. The sisters, Bianca and Rosa, whispered and competed. But Enzo… Enzo was often the one left out of photographs, forgotten when food ran short, and yet — he remembered everything.
Their father, Salvatore Marino, was a stern man of few words and fewer affections. His back was curved from working in the fields and his hands never shook — not even when he hit his sons. He believed in discipline, tradition, and silence. But it was Enzo's mother, Maria, who stitched together the soul of the household. She had gentle eyes, the kind that never accused, even when her children failed.
Enzo clung to her like breath. She smelled of rosemary and firewood, and whenever she touched his forehead with her calloused hands, the world made sense. She was his only softness in a life that had already begun to harden.
By the age of seven, Enzo was already helping on the farms, barefoot in cracked soil, lifting buckets too heavy for his frame. Yet he never complained. Even then, he observed — how men made deals under their breath, how neighbors smiled while cursing each other behind closed doors. He learned early that kindness could be a mask, and poverty a teacher.
At night, when the house went still, Enzo would lie awake staring at the wooden ceiling. He could hear his siblings breathing around him. But in his heart, there were streets he had never walked, towers he had never seen, and wealth he had never touched. He didn't want to be king of a field. He wanted cities to kneel before him.
He told his mother once, "I want to live in Rome. With my own car. And marble floors."
She had smiled and touched his hair. "First learn how to walk through fire, my boy. Then dream of palaces."
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