The Boy with Frizzy Hair

He was just a kid who grew up in the South: frizzy hair, a dirty face, and a hole where his soul should have been. Raised on hierarchy and Siberian discipline. At nine, he saw his first dead body, gunned down. He felt nothing — only curiosity. At twelve, his father was incellato, his mother a putèca, with the boy always at her side. He felt nothing — only awareness. At sixteen, he made his first mistakes, out of respect for his elders. At eighteen, he became a man. At twenty, his heart had turned to lead. Awareness turned cold. His father never saw the same son again after he walked out of that cell.

Glossary

incellato (Neapolitan dialect): imprisoned; locked up. putèca (Neapolitan dialect): working in the family shop.