At first, it was possible to borrow some money to get stuff you couldn’t quite afford. Then it became commonplace to borrow money for major purchases like cars and houses. Then credit got cheap. Now it’s ubiquitous, and living beyond your means is just expected.
Most Americans carry some debt—college loans, a mortgage, a monthly car payment. Many have credit card debt. But some are just in really, really deep. Like this character. She just wanted nice things like her friends had! At first, the payments were manageable. Then she was only paying the minimum amount and it started to snowball, until she was kiting from one card to another. Now, now she is deeply screwed, because she’s borrowed money from some deeply unpleasant people.
She hasn’t declared bankruptcy or restructured her debts because, as long as she’s dancing as fast as she can, she can pay the vig on her mob loan and the minimum on her credit cards and throw away the other final notices before her husband gets home. But she’s hard up. Whatever else she has going on, she would jump on any vaguely plausible legal way to earn a lot of money fast. As for an illegal way, she’d either jump on it after some thought, or keep thinking a long time, depending on how illegal it was.
She doesn’t get another Identity, but she does get a few more Hard notches in Isolation, Self and Helplessness, along with some Helplessness fails.