Due

Due was a crow-tween — glossy, sharp-eyed, and famous for keeping careful accounts and never, ever forgetting a promise. She talked about borrowing the way a careful pilot talks about weather: with respect, without fear, and never with shame. "Borrowing money," she said, tapping her ledger, "is spending your future money early. Someone hands you value now, and you promise to hand it back later — plus a little extra for the wait. That extra is the whole point to understand, so let me name the parts."

She wrote three words in her neat crow-hand. "The principal is the amount you borrowed — the actual money that changed hands. The interest is the cost of the wait — the extra you pay for using someone else's money before it was yours. And the rate, usually written as an APR — an annual percentage rate — is how fast the interest piles on, measured per year. Same borrowed amount, higher rate, faster the debt grows. Those three numbers — principal, rate, and how long until you pay — tell you almost everything about a loan. A borrower who doesn't know all three is flying blind."

Then Due taught the part that catches people out, the part that grows in the dark. "Here's what makes debt serious and not just annoying," she said. "Debt compounds — and it compounds against you. If you don't pay the interest, it doesn't just sit there politely. It joins the principal, becomes part of what you owe, and then itself starts earning interest. Interest on interest. So a debt left alone doesn't grow in a straight line — it accelerates, faster and faster the longer it waits. That's why 'I'll deal with it later' is the most expensive sentence in borrowing. The promise grows while you aren't looking. Borrowing longer always costs more."