South Africa. The late 1980s.
Martin Pistorius had just turned 12.
"Ma, I think I'm getting flu," he told his mother.
It wasn't the flu.
He began sleeping nearly all day, like a baby. When he woke, he refused food. He had nosebleeds.
Over the following months, he lost everything, one piece at a time. The ability to move on his own. To look someone in the eye. And finally, to speak.
The last thing he ever said, his mother remembers, was asking when he could go home.
Doctors searched for an answer. They suspected an infection of the brain, but never pinned down the cause.
Then they told his parents there was no hope.
"He's a vegetable. He has zero intelligence."
— Rodney Pistorius, his father, recalling what they were told
Take him home, the doctors said. Try to keep him comfortable until he dies.
Martin didn't die.