The Best at It

In these chapters, Rahul continues trying to be the “best,” this time through acting, but is confronted with racial discrimination that seems to confirm Rahul’s notions of “normativity.” However, these chapters strongly draw out the theme of The Importance of Positive Support Systems for Young People. Chelsea, Mr. Wilson, Rahul’s parents, and Bhai all support and defend Rahul.

Rahul wears makeup to the audition that is “so white” that Arun tells him he looks like a “clown” (141). He likes the way the makeup lightens his skin, believing his own brown skin to be less desirable. This moment underscores Rahul’s complex feelings about his racial identity, highlighting the pressures faced by marginalized individuals to conform to societal standards of beauty that privilege whiteness. This pressure is magnified by Brent’s bullying, which makes Rahul’s fears about his identity feel provoked or proven true. The way that Rahul edits his mom’s answers on his audition questionnaire to seem less Indian also shows how Rahul is struggling with Figuring Out and Accepting One’s Identity, particularly his racial and ethnic identity. While some people around Rahul celebrate their identity, like his mom’s event for the International Bazaar and his dad’s band, Bollywood Supply, Rahul receives messages from outside his family that he is “different” and therefore less valuable than other boys—specifically white boys.

The one non-white person on the casting committee, Wyatt, says that Rahul’s audition is a “pleasant surprise” (156). This comment makes Rahul realize that the boys in the main room who he thought were so “perfect” were almost entirely white. Wyatt’s comment reflects both the lack of diversity in industries like acting and Rahul’s discomfort in a space where whiteness dominates as the standard. A white casting director, Mark, tells Rahul before he can audition, “[U]nfortunately you’re not the right […] how should I say this? You’re not the right ‘type’ for this commercial” (158). He shows Rahul a picture of the parents who were cast, both white, to make his implicit meaning clear: He doesn’t want to see Rahul’s audition or consider him for the part because he isn’t white.

Rahul doesn’t feel like he can stand up for himself in the audition. This inability reflects the systemic pressures faced by young people of color in spaces that devalue their voices and contributions, reinforcing feelings of powerlessness. It also highlights the fact that, in this point in the text, Rahul feels defeated by the external pressures that have convinced him that he is not worthy of the same consideration as his peers. Chelsea, meanwhile, demonstrates the benefit of having a friend who knows how to utilize their voice and privilege to speak up for friends with marginalized identities. She corrects them on how to say Rahul’s name. When Rahul claims that he understands the mispronunciation because it’s a “weird name,” Chelsea points out how familiarity and unfamiliarity of names is culturally contingent by saying, “No weirder than Mark” (157). Chelsea demands that the adults in the audition question why they are unwilling to rethink the commercial. After the audition, Chelsea realizes the seriousness of what happened and takes the issue to the adults in their lives, demonstrating her sense of maturity and desire to protect Rahul. 

Rahul’s mom and dad were at odds during Rahul’s attempt to become the “best” at football due to his dad’s capitulation to Vinay. After the audition, their interests are realigned as they defend Rahul. Though the bank dismisses their complaint, they decide that they are “taking [their] money to a new bank” (168). They refuse to forget how Rahul was treated, and they demonstrate their support of him in the choices they make. Their unified stance highlights the strength of parental advocacy in countering systemic inequities. While Rahul’s parents defend him, Bhai also tries to support him by asking him important questions about identity. Bhai tries to coax Rahul into questioning how Rahul conceives of whiteness as “perfect.” He asks, “[W]hy did he have to be white? Or more importantly, why do you agree he had to be white?” (190). This line of questioning invites Rahul to critically examine the internalized biases that reinforce harmful hierarchies of identity. Bhai encourages Rahul to think not only about the systems of supposed normativity in place around them but also about how they have contributed to Rahul’s own perception of whiteness.

Despite his supportive friends and family, these experiences make Rahul feel embarrassed by his culture. He panics when the Auntie Squad comes to the assembly in saris. The popular girls, like Trina, who are sitting near Rahul call the saris “so cute,” and they “wonder if [they] could get one of those at the mall” (173). The girls genuinely admire the saris, but Rahul’s thought patterns twist the aunties’ presence into something shameful. Later, when his mom asks if he was bothered by them wearing saris, he says, “It doesn’t bother me. But Mom, you should have heard what the other kids were saying” (186). When his mom presses further, asking what they were saying, Rahul cannot elaborate. He realizes in retrospect that his extreme feelings of emotional panic were misaligned with the actual events of the day, where the girls only spoke about how “they thought the saris were awesome” (186). This moment reflects how Rahul’s self-consciousness about his cultural identity amplifies his perception of judgment, even when it does not exist. Though Rahul doesn’t have language for what he experienced, it lines up with a cognitive distortion common for people with OCD or anxiety disorders called dichotomous thinking. These are “negative absolutist thinking patterns” where someone “only sees one extreme or the other” to a detrimental degree (“All-or-Nothing Thinking: The Impact of a Black-and-White Mentality.” Embark Behavioral Health). For Rahul, who has experienced bullying and discrimination in his quest to become the “best,” identifying with the aunties’ visibly non-western clothing choice feels like a vulnerability that he will be ostracized for. This demonstrates how mental health challenges intersect with societal pressures, creating internal conflicts that Rahul must navigate as part of figuring out and accepting one’s identity.