He placed his right palm against the partition.
Rusty approached until his nose was inches from Jason's hand.
There were two layers of glass between them, separated by a narrow air space.
Close enough to see.
Too far to smell properly.
Too far to touch.
Rusty sniffed anyway.
Jason lowered his face.
For nearly ten years, touching this dog had required no thought.
A hand dropped onto his head while watching television.
A scratch behind the ears in the kitchen.
A foot resting against his side beneath the desk.
Ordinary contact becomes invisible through repetition.
Now Jason could see individual gray hairs around Rusty's eyes and could not touch a single one.
His forehead moved closer to the glass.
Rusty stared at him.
Then the dog lifted one front paw.
Rebecca did not cue him.
Nobody asked for it.
Rusty shifted his weight and placed the paw against the lower section of glass.
Jason saw it.
His expression broke.
He lowered his hand until his palm aligned with the paw.
From the angle of the person holding the phone on the visitor side, the two almost appeared to touch.
They did not.
The distance was only inches.
It might as well have been miles.
Jason's fingers trembled against the glass.
A tear ran down his face.
Rusty kept his paw there.
Neither one looked away.
Keller stood several feet behind Jason.
He had expected emotion.
People see family members through jail glass every day, and emotion itself was not unusual.
What caught his attention was the stillness.
Jason was not asking for anything.
He was not turning around toward the deputy.
He was not trying to use the scene to negotiate.
He seemed to have forgotten anyone else was in the room.
The dog seemed equally uninterested in everything except the person on the other side.
Keller checked the wall clock.
Then he watched another thirty seconds.
Before the visit, he had already spoken with his administrator about one additional possibility.
The jail had a small secure interview room beside the visitation area. It was occasionally used for attorneys, clergy, and other approved circumstances.
Keller had asked a simple hypothetical question.