The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep

by H.G. Parry

Words on paper are quiet, and porous; in the right mood, I sink down between the gaps in the letters and they close over my head.

“Pasifika culture has a concept called the va,” I said, despite myself. It was something we’d learned about in law school. “The space between two people, or cultures. Sort of an imaginary landscape, made up of the social, personal, and spiritual bonds that comprise the relationship.”