Wilson and Omar are two men living in the Marche region, a place widely considered one of the most peaceful areas in Italy. Wilson arrived from Ghana, Omar from Gambia. Both have endured the harrowing journey to Europe: the dangerous trek across the desert, the brutality of Libyan detention camps, and the life-threatening risk of shipwreck in the Mediterranean Sea. Once they finally reached Macerata, their lives seemed poised to take a different direction, far from the daily violence that had haunted them since childhood. However, on February 3, 2018, something happened that once again turned their lives upside down: Luca Traini, a neo-fascist from Tolentino, attempted to carry out a mass shooting targeting Black migrants to avenge the death of Pamela, a young woman killed just days earlier by a Nigerian drug dealer. Neither Wilson nor Omar, nor any of the other victims of the racist raid, had anything to do with the girl’s death. Both narrowly escaped death, hit by bullets fired that day, chosen at random as culprits simply because they were African. They were swept into a deranged spiral of “us” versus “them,” shaking the fragile tranquility of the Italian countryside.
The story aims to give voice and dignity to the victims of an attempted massacre, where media and political attention focused on the perpetrator rather than those who suffered. This asymmetrical, far-from-accidental bias weighs heavily on the lives of our protagonists, Wilson and Omar. Despite everything, their response to the attack demonstrates a deep attachment to life and to an idea of the future that seems absent among those who despise and blame them simply for being Black.