Myrlie and Tom had a daughter named Jocelyn (aka Joss). Myrlie’s sister (Hillary) and her husband (Walter) had a daughter only two months older named Elizabeth. Joss and Elizabeth grew up to be inseparable best friends (in addition to being cousins).
On Elizabeth’s 13th birthday, her, Joss, Myrlie, Tom, Hillary, and Walter went to an amusement park. Unfortunately, on the drive back, they got into an accident, and Elizabeth and Tom died.
Walter was able to preserve some of Elizabeth’s tissue cells, and because he worked in medical research, he was able to clone her, thereby producing Bethany (fittingly named after a location where Jesus resurrected Lazarus). Because he only had the resources to clone one person at that time, he was supposed to be trying to clone his financial donor (embezzler Dalton Van Dyne), but Walter figured that he could always have another chance whereas Elizabeth’s frozen cells wouldn’t. Dalton got arrested for suspicious monetary transactions before Bethany was born.
13 years later, Dalton gets released from prison, and Hillary and Walter are on the run. They’re afraid of Dalton confronting them, so they drop off Bethany to the only person they trust (Myrlie) and expect Dalton to chase after them. However, eventually Hillary and Walter come back and Bethany reveals the truth that she was the clone instead. Dalton (who seemed like a big scary guy for most of the story), cries and turns out to just be a self-conceited, lonely man who wanted another version of himself for him to love (and who could love him in return). Dalton changes his ways and begins donating to charity and pouring love outwards instead.
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How much is up to nature vs nurture?
Just like how identical twins should be treated as two separate beings, so should clones.
There is an undeniable resemblance between Elizabeth and Bethany due to their identical genetic nature. They look the same, sound the same, and have the same food tastes.
However, one key difference is that Elizabeth loved gymnastics and hated swimming while Bethany loved swimming. During Elizabeth’s first time in a pool, she unexpectedly went underwater for a couple seconds, inhaled some water, and was so spooked from that experience that she never wanted to get back in a pool again. Bethany had a similar experience except she took a breath before submerging and fell in love with the alternate universe that seemed to lie underwater.
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How should we deal with tragedy?
While Joss was recovering in the hospital, she drove herself crazy with questions about why things happened the way that they did. She came to a point where she decided to put all her time she spent pondering to use by double-majoring in theology and biology (which aren’t contradictory, as her academic counselors may have thought) and becoming a (non-Catholic) female minister to try to help others (even though she still doesn’t have all the answers yet).
“Science and religion deal with different questions. Science is how things happen and religion is why. The problem comes when people forget what they’re asking of whom” (117).
“You can drive yourself crazy trying to fathom God’s will so simplistically, put everything into neat little boxes and categories. I don’t think He wanted anyone to die. But He let it happen because of free will, because we’re not God’s little robots, preprogrammed to live out our lives without getting to make any choices of our own” (153).
“When I got done crying, I walked away from that exhibit with this strange sense of peace, and I didn’t have to ask anymore why Elizabeth died, why Daddy died, why I didn’t. The new question I was obsessed with was, ‘Okay, I lived -- now what am I supposed to do with my life?” (154).