The pattern to these stories provides a creepy echo to the serial killer's "type." In each, a woman makes a mistake (usually a pregnancy), and goes on to become an alcoholic. They all have very little in the way of family or social safety net to keep them from falling into homelessness. I can imagine what it would have been like for Kate, and I can almost see myself taking that chance on life with a charming travelling salesman rather than staying in my current life of hard labor. Of course it wasn't going to work out, but a life of working poverty doesn't have a future either.