Noa Essengue doesn’t need to look far to remind himself of the force driving him from Paris to Chicago.

For the Bulls rookie, a simple glance at his wrist is enough.

Before Essengue left home two years ago to pursue his first professional basketball contract in Germany, he inked two sets of numbers on the inside of his left wrist — the birthdates of his mother and brother — below the message “Family is forever” in English.

Through the loneliness and uncertainty of being a 16-year-old pro in a new country, they were all Essengue needed to keep grounded. And now they’re providing the same anchor after he moved halfway across the world to play for the Bulls, who selected the 18-year-old Frenchman with the No. 12 pick in the NBA draft last month.

For most of Essengue’s life, it has been just the three of them. Ingrid, a math teacher raising two boys. Mathis, the older son by 5 years, trying his best to be the man of the house. And Noa, always dreaming of something a little bigger.

“They do everything for me,” Essengue told the Tribune. “If I’m in a good mood, bad mood, if I need food, money, anything, they always give everything for me. Sometimes they don’t have food for them, but they give me food. So I just want to give everything I’ve got for them.”

The tattoos on Essengue’s left arm reflect another truth about the rookie: He wants to be the one to tell his story.

Before he ever fell in love with basketball, drawing offered a similar escape. He grew up doodling with Mathis and tracing his favorite manga characters from “Naruto” and “Haikyu!!” Over time, those sketches became more serious, taking the form of tattoo designs.

Essengue knew he didn’t want someone else’s art on his body, so he drew up full-sleeve designs — a trio of crosses, Japanese lettering, a rose spanning the back of a hand. His first major design now spans from the base of his wrist to the inner crook of his elbow. It’s an elaboration of a real picture: Essengue as a boy, the No. 12 on his back, standing at the bottom of a staircase leading into a skyline vista.

In the tattoo, the steps at the base are cracked, a representation of his childhood challenges. The view at the top is bright, sunny. Happy.

“That’s me,” Essengue said, tracing a finger across the image of himself gazing up toward something hopeful. “You know, not from anything, but someday will be brought to the sky. Getting better every day.”

Over the last six years, it became clear basketball would become the mechanism for Essengue to ascend that staircase. His path to the NBA moved quicker than those of many other top prospects in this year’s draft.

It took Essengue a little longer than other boys to find his way to basketball. He didn’t start playing seriously until he was 11. Before that, he mostly chased after Mathis’ favored hobbies, playing volleyball in the summers, swapping sketches after school.

Essengue tried tennis and judo, but both sports left athletes on an island. He craved the keen drive of competition, but he also wanted to play on a team. Basketball brought that in droves. A responsibility to his teammates. A sense of belonging.

“You don’t want to be all by yourself,” Essengue said. “It was always more fun to play basketball with all my friends, with other people. That’s really something that would take me to another level.”

Basketball became natural. Essengue grew quickly, nearing 6-foot-9 in bare feet by the time he was 16. His sprawling hands corralled loose balls and wayward shots with ease. He rarely was the brawniest kid on the court, but he wasn’t afraid to put a shoulder into a defender.

And if he got a chance to make a break for it down an open court — well, at that point, he was already long gone.

Essengue was scouted by Orléans Loiret Basket Association, where he played his first three years of youth basketball. By 14, he had signed to play with INSEP, a developmental academy in Paris. Two years later, he moved to southern Germany to join Ratiopharm Ulm, a 16-year-old who spoke only rudimentary English — and no German.

Ulm was a challenge. It also proved to Essengue that he was talented enough to compete at a higher level. He moved from the developmental third-tier squad to the senior team, then began earning starts. In October 2024, he received his first call-up from the French national team, validating an increased role — and impact — for Ulm.

During those years in Germany, Essengue began to craft an image of himself as an NBA player. He took inspiration from Scottie Barnes and Pascal Siakam, lengthy wings who can put the ball on the floor and muck things up on defense. But for Essengue, one player stood out from the rest: Paul George.

He’s not alone in this preference. Second-year Bulls forward Matas Buzelis is also an acolyte of George, the 15-year NBA veteran who is a favored player among recent draftees in their late teens and early 20s.

Part of the appeal for Essengue is George’s stature as a two-way player — “playing the right way,” as he described. He also hopes to emulate the smooth style that has defined George throughout his career.

“He’s also got that fancy side,” Essengue said. “Playing like that, it makes you feel cool.”

Essengue still carries himself with the unruliness of a teenager growing into his gangly size. Teammates and coaches reference his age relentlessly — if you haven’t heard, he won’t turn 19 until December. But there’s a calm to him that his new team noticed during his first two weeks in Chicago.

“The one thing that stands out to me is just how mature he is,” Bulls summer league coach Billy Donovan III said. “He’s asking the right questions and he’s been very engaged.”

That confidence is mostly a credit to his years in the European professional leagues — especially in Ulm, where he left behind his childhood for good.

Essengue was still a kid, but he had to learn to handle everyday life like an adult. He cooked for himself, squeezed in high school studies in the mornings. During stretches of boredom, he pulled out his iPad to work on sketches of his favorite “One Piece” characters. Almost every night, he called his mom, who remained back in Paris, their childhood home suddenly quiet.

By the time Essengue signed with Ulm in 2023, leaving was no longer a new phenomenon for his close-knit family. Mathis had left home five years earlier at 14 for his next level of education. It was hard on their mother to watch both sons move away so young. But it also never was a debate. Leaving was simply a necessity for boys with big dreams.

“She was always happy for me, happy for him,” Essengue said. “We knew it was the right thing. She did everything for us, so she just let us live our dreams.”

Chicago is even farther from home. But this time Essengue brought his mother on the journey. Ingrid accompanied him to draft night in New York and on his first tour of the Bulls facility, also joining him and the team on a private cruise of the Chicago River and lakefront. Over Fourth of July weekend, they walked to Navy Pier, craning their necks to watch the largest fireworks display either had ever seen.

Essengue takes joy in these little moments he can provide for his mother. He takes even more pride in the larger gifts he soon can bestow on his family. Mathis will come to see his brother in Chicago once he finishes school in France. And upon signing his rookie contract, Essengue plans to have Ingrid retire.

The rest of the NBA dream will come soon enough. Essengue makes his summer league debut Friday night in Las Vegas. In a matter of months, he could be playing his first minutes at the United Center.

But for Essengue, the heart of his lifelong dream — offering his mother the steady support she provided to him as a child — is already close to being accomplished.

“I want to take care of her,” he said. “If she needs something, now I am the one to give it. She can just do everything she wants. She doesn’t need to be worried about anything. It’s what she gave me and it’s what I give to her.”