"The chief clerk must be detained, soothed, persuaded, and finally won over; the whole future of Gregor and his family depended on it!" (pg.1120) When he was a human and now as a cockroach Gregor still has to try and find a way to pay off this debt that has accumulated as a result of his father's business failing. His dad also shares this same debt because it was his business that failed, but in a different way because he's real lazy so he's not really doing anything about it. Being in debt can be physical because of the all the stress, or psychological or emotional because you might always think about it.
Most people will have to go through owing a debt. If its a minor debt or a huge one just about everybody will at some point be in debt. To get a car or a house you have to take out a loan, and that's debt. But other people might be big gamblers and get into debt that way. Someone might be able to get rid of their debt after a lot of work and saving money but it would be pretty hard depending on how much you owe
