Zezé is a poor, intelligent, sensitive, and needy six-year-old boy. He lacks affection, which he doesn't find in his family – nobody has much patience with him. The mischievous little boy roams the streets getting into all sorts of trouble. He learns everything on his own, he's a "discoverer of things." When the family moves to a house with many trees in the yard, each sibling chooses one for themselves – one gets the mango tree, another the tamarind tree, and so on. Zezé is left with a small lime tree. However, this tree becomes such a good friend that they talk a lot and even play together. Zezé invents a fantasy world for himself where his great confidant is Minguinho, the lime tree. However, life teaches him everything too soon, and Zezé discovers pain and longing, as well as tenderness and affection in the lonely Portuguese man Manuel Valadares, or Portuga, as the boy calls him.