Pensacola, Florida—this is an era when the town is cobblestones, iron balconies, and men in straw skimmer hats.

A trolley rolls down Palafox. Ships in the bay have smokestacks. It's hot outside.

Young Albert is a trumpet player. He has talent. His father, the attorney, calls him lazy. He says music is a dead-end profession.

He says Albert won’t amount to anything in this world if he plays music. So, the boy works loading crates in the harbor.

On weekends, he plays with the Salvation Army Band to keep his lips in shape. They’re a good band, they play hymns in front of the bank on Government and Palafox to raise money for the poor.

The other side of Government Street:

A couple shuffles the sidewalk. Man and woman, middle-age, dressed in ratty clothes. They have accordions strapped to their chests, and tin cups with rattling with coins. They wear darkened glasses.

They are blind.

They don’t often play on Government Street. Today, they're hoping to earn enough to buy supper.

The woman sings tunes she’s learned from the radio. She has

a good ear. She can hear a melody once and play it.

Albert and the band take a break to rest their mouths and replace fluids. The fellas remove jackets and fan themselves.

This is Northwest Florida. The sun can melt a man like candle wax.

“Ssshhh,” says Albert. “You hear that?”

Everyone listens.

“I hear it,” says Trombone.

“Sounds like an accordion,” adds Bass Drum.

The band is a curious lot. They go investigate.

Albert stops walking. He listens to the music, then presses the mouthpiece against his lips to play along. French Horn finds a part to play, too. Snare Drum, Fluglehorn, and Tuba do the same.

Soon, the boys have joined the blind woman’s song. Together, they play a secular melody—which has been strictly prohibited by the Official Salvation Army Rulebook, section 207-A, paragraph 3.

She’s a pretty girl. Sophisticated walk. All business. She’s trotting a dirt road, wearing a purple collar, no tags.

I’ve seen her here for a few days now. I have a feeling she’s far from home.

I call to her, but she’s skittish.

I finally negotiate her into my truck. But not because I am skilled in canine dialect—I am not. It's because I bribe her with raw, room-temperature hamburger. She pees on my seat cushion. She is old.

I take her home.

She’s white, but covered in mud. She hates baths—this I discover the hard way. I turn on the garden hose; she breaks away and runs for Nolensville, Tennessee.

I am able to coax her to return with more ground beef. She eats another pound. This dog is going to land me in the poorhouse.

I scrub her with Dawn dish soap. I have seen television commercials featuring eco-activists washing baby ducks rescued from Gulf oil-spills. They use Dawn.

I call her Bobby Jo Gentry.

Then, I dial the vet and ask what I ought to do.

The lady on

the phone laughs. “Just love her,” she says. “You might never find her owner, might have to keep her.”

Bobby Jo becomes part of my life for a week. She sleeps with my dogs in my bedroom. I buy a forty-dollar dog bed, a neon-orange collar, and canned food for elderly animals.

She gains weight. There is nothing I like more than fat dogs in orange collars.

She falls into my daily routine. We become friends. I talk to her. She listens. She’s gentle and humble at heart, the only of my dogs who likes watching baseball with me.

A knock on my door.

It’s a weekend, midday. I am listening to Atlanta play Milwaukee while in my office.

I look out the window. An unfamiliar car in my driveway. Jehovah’s Witnesses, maybe. I am prepared to answer…

He’s sitting beside me. We’re both waiting for haircuts. His hair is thick, pure white. His beard is shaggy. He’s got skin like old boot leather.

There’s a woman with him, she’s in her late-thirties. Maybe forty. She is wearing a Pizza-Hut uniform.

The barber calls out, "I’m ready for you, sir,” while sweeping clumps of blonde hair from his recent victim.

The woman helps the old man to the big chair. He holds her arm. The barber asks what kind of haircut he wants.

“D-d-d-d...” the old man struggles to say. “S-s-s...” He’s working hard to make words.

But nothing.

The young woman interrupts, “Cut it short, it's way too long.” Then, she returns to the sitting area and sits beside me. The barber trims the man’s mop with commercial hedge-clippers.

“What about the beard?” the barber asks. “You want it trimmed, too?”

The old man stammers so hard, his face contorts. He looks like he’s in pain. His heart is there, the words aren’t.

The young woman hollers, “Give him a shave. He needs it.”

She leans backward into her seat and

takes a deep breath. She sighs, closes her eyes. She is too young to be so tired.

Her phone rings. She walks outside to answer it. She paces the sidewalk, flinging hands in the air, talking into the mouthpiece. Whoever she's yelling at is getting an earful of words.

A customer enters. When the barbershop door opens, I can overhear her outside. She’s saying, “Can't this wait? I've been working all day...”

She’s outside for a good while. When she returns to her seat, she has a red face—she's sniffing, wiping her eyes.

When the barber finishes, he removes the old man’s cape and spins him toward his reflection. He gives him a hand-mirror. The old man’s hand shakes so violently, he drops it.

Then, he tries to form words, but can't.

The young woman springs…

Dothan, Alabama—three years ago today. The television is playing in Steve Hardwick’s living room. It's one of those home-shopping channels.

Steve is the fella in the recliner. He has a perpetual smile. White goatee. He is the kind of man who parks a Harley in the garage.

The television advertises a KitchenAid mixer. A miracle-appliance made for bread, pizza crust, pasta, sausage, baklava, schnitzel, pedicures, cutting residential lawns, filing taxes, and whipping up poundcake.

Steve turns the volume down.

“Betcha I could make a few cakes with that thing and raise a few hundred bucks for Cody Hayes,” he says.

Cody Hayes.

The boy from Ashford. Seventeen. A hunter, Jeep-rider, a ‘Bama-cheering, camo-hat-wearing kid with leukemia.

It was an impulsive thought.

“I’d never even met Cody,” Steve tells me. “Only saw pictures on Facebook.”

Steve's idea was simple. Sell poundcakes; raise money.

He bought the mixer. Then, the thick-framed man baked one hundred cakes. He titled the fundraising effort, “Cakes for Cody.”

He hoped to drum up few hundred bucks. But it didn't go as planned. He raised nine grand.

Then Cody passed.

“It changed me,” says Steve. “Used to, I’d hear about kids with cancer and think, ‘That’s awful,’ and just go on about my day. Not after Cody died.”

No.

Steve started more fundraisers: Cakes for Libby. Cakes for Conner. Cakes for Paresia. Cakes for Paisley. The list is long. But not long enough for Steve.

He says, “These families need money bad, I hear lotta sad stories. One parent told me they almost lost their home.”

Late one night, while Steve sat in his chair, he received news of another cancer-death. A girl. It stabbed at him.

“Thought to myself, ‘I’m tired of people forgetting about these kids who die.’”

So, he launched a different kind of fundraiser. The next day, he met with city commissioners, county officials, and the mayor. This was bigger than poundcake. It…

The doctor told her she couldn’t have kids. It made her feel broken. Like a busted washing machine. That is, until she met a man with a daughter.

She launched into being a mother.

Motherhood suited her. The little girl's name was Ella, she came from her husband’s first marriage.

His previous wife disappeared years earlier, turning him into a single father overnight. Some said the woman left because of drugs. Others said she was certifiable.

But none of that mattered now because Ella had a new mother.

The wedding was in a courthouse. After signing the wedding certificate, the happy couple ate lunch at a steakhouse.

"We both had that honeymoon glow," she said. "It was all I thought it would be.”

Eight months into marriage, the glow got snuffed out. Her husband was on his way home from Atlanta. They believe he fell asleep at the wheel. His car caught fire. He didn't make it.

“I pretended like I was strong,” she said. “But it was a lie. The whole time, I was like 'Why God, why? I didn’t even

get a full year with him.'”

Why.

Her grief got interrupted. It was a phone call, midday. A high-pitched voice on the other end of the line. A five-year-old in Oklahoma.

“Hello ma’am,” said the voice. “Did my dad die?”

The words hit her like a stiff slap.

The little girl’s name was Sandra. His ex-wife had told nobody about her birth. One September day the woman dropped Sandra at a friend's house and said, "I'll be back in a few days, honey."

She never returned.

Our heroine couldn’t sleep for two nights. She thought about Sandra, even though she'd never met her. She re-dialed the Oklahoma number one night.

“Would you like to meet your older sister?” she asked the five-year-old.

Sandra said yes.

She used her vacation time and drove with Ella from Alabama to Oklahoma.…

It’s a sunny day. Coach Don Jacobs kneels by two headstones. Both bear his last name. On the left: his late daughter, Sarah Jacobs—she died too young. He cries.

Men like Don Jacobs do not cry.

Don played for Bear Bryant. Starting quarterback. Late ‘70’s dream-team. He helped Alabama take the ‘79 national championship.

He was a young man when Bryant first said to him—in a trademarked Biblical voice: “Ain’t what happens to you in life, son, but how you deal with it.”

Don’s life was a good one. After college, he had a promising career in coaching. A talented leader. A good family. Then, one of his daughters died. She was fourteen. Beautiful. Smart.

Her car was found twisted around a telephone pole. Everything changed.

Life went on. Don bounced the small-town high-school football circuit like a pinball. Luverne, Robertsdale, Coosa County, Elkmont. A faceless local hero, teaching basic drills to boys barely old enough to shave.

He taught patience, morality, and fight slogans favored by coaches across rural America. Such as: "When you win, nothing hurts."

Or:

"Winners never quit, and quitters never win."

Or: “‘Ain’t what happens to you in life, but how you deal with it.”

Don became head coach for the underdog team at Oneonta High. He was overqualified, it was a gutsy career move. They were a group who hadn't made it far in the playoffs. Nobody expected much from Oneonta.

Then, his wife got pregnant.

It was bliss. Euphoria, even. But his excitement was short-lived. Their son, Joe, was born with a hole in his heart.

I don’t know whether Don was angry at God, but he had every right to be.

He spent most of his days in a Birmingham hospital, the rest on the turf. His team should have started to fall apart. It didn’t.

“It was the opposite,” says his wife. “The players pulled for our baby, prayed for him.…

Birmingham, Alabama—a hospital room. A steady beeping noise. The fluid bag doles out one drop at a time. Fluorescent lights. The god-awful smell of disinfectant.

Four-year-old Paisley Corbitt is a long way from her home in Graceville. She's fast asleep. When her mother walks in, she doesn’t wake her.

Paisley is worn thin. She's been through hell. Sleep is precious.

Paisely is a towhead with the face of a cherub. She has slept in this bed for too many nights—off and on. This small-town girl would rather be fishing for bream, running in the woods barefoot, or watching TV.

Anything but this.

In January, she got diagnosed with neuroblastoma. If you don’t know what that is, think: the worst cancer imaginable. Then triple it. Then, multiply it by sheer horror. Carry the two. Divide by your worst nightmare.

Her treatment clipboard reads like the unabridged Japanese Dictionary. Five rounds of chemo, invasive surgery, more high-dose chemo, stem-cell transplant, radiation, immunotherapy.

Like I said. Hell.

The family hasn’t had a good night’s sleep in months. They live in the Birmingham hospital.

They eat whatever they can get out of vending machines.

“It’s been hard,” says her mother. “Even harder with two kids. Her brother doesn’t realize what’s happening, he just wants her better so she can play again.”

That makes two of us.

Paisley is weak. She’s lost weight. Her skin is pale. Her hair is falling out. She wears a mask. It is a long, woeful road ahead. A fight. But she is not alone. And that’s why I’m writing this.

“Our community has overwhelmed us,” says her mother. “Graceville has given so much support, food, and love… People have even thrown fundraisers.”

There's a local flyer. It reads: "Team Paisley Raffle." On the front is the photo of a smiling four-year-old with white-blonde hair. Five dollars per ticket. Win a Yeti cooler. I understand they sold a shipload of…

This is the quintessential beer joint. There are pool tables, chain-smokers, dartboards, a jukebox, and a plywood stage. There’s a young guitarist. He knows three songs. He repeats them.

I think he's overdue for a break.

My friend tells a waitress that I am a writer—if that's what you call it. My pal is only teasing me. The waitress says she has a good story.

And without awaiting my response, she's already telling it.

She is the quintessential barmaid—a no-nonsense woman, mid-fifties, a few tattoos on her forearm. Tough.

“Okay,” she begins, like she’s rehearsed. “So there was this homeless guy..."

I like the story already.

She tells me the man rode his bike all over town. She often saw him on her way to work and wondered where he was going.

So one day, she followed him. He lived behind a strip mall, in the woods. She discovered he had a son.

“It was enough to break your heart,” she adds. “They were living underneath a tarp.”

The next day, she and a friend delivered gift bags. A prepaid cellphone, snacks,

clothes, toys, food. As many items as they could fit into a few gym bags.

“He was skittish,” she said. “Very protective of his son, didn’t want us getting close.”

She couldn’t get him off her mind. She contacted her brother-in-law—a church deacon. She convinced his church to offer the man a room and meals.

One night, she approached the homeless man with the offer. She walked right into his camp. This woman is fearless.

He refused. He told her he didn’t want her charity.

"So I got in his face," she says. "Told him if he didn’t take my handout, I was gon' call the law and have his kid removed."

Magic.

He moved into a small Sunday-school room which she and her friends had outfitted with beds and a mini-fridge. The church agreed to hire him…