Page 137 of The Dixon Rule

Niall Gentry

Red Birch, 1B

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

SHANE

Shane is the sausage king

SEPTEMBER

“THIS IS WHAT I’VE ALWAYS DREAMED OF.”

“What?” Diana says suspiciously from the driver’s seat. I have benevolently allowed her to drive to Oak Ridges, but that’s only because I need to read through a bunch of the emails Coach Jensen sent regarding the upcoming season. Practice starts next week.

“Meeting my fake girlfriend’s real family,” I explain with a grin.

Ironically, she didn’t even ask me to come to this end-of-summer potluck at her dad’s place. I invited myself. But what else was I going to do once I heard it’s not just any old potluck—it’s a bring-your-own-meat event. And yes, there are a million jokes I could be making about the kind of meat I can bring Diana, but who has time to make jokes when they can be thinking about all the sausage they picked up from Gustav’s.

“I mean, I already spent the weekend with yours,” she says. “At this point, we should be announcing our engagement.”

“I’m not announcing our fake engagement to your SWAT leader father. He’ll kick my ass when I leave you at the altar.”

Diana snorts. “We both know I’m the one who’s not showing up for our wedding.”

“Hey, is your mom going to be there today?”

She starts to laugh. “Absolutely not. Even if she and my dad were on great terms—and they’re on cordial terms at best—she’s not a fan of my stepmother. Larissa is too common for her.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Well, my mom is a pretentious academia snob, and Larissa is a hairdresser, so put two and two together.”

“I don’t know, if I had to pick, I’d rather get a haircut than a lecture about philosophy or whatever. More practical.”

“You should tell that to my mom if you ever meet her. Which hopefully you won’t because she’d probably hate you.”

I tense slightly. “Why? Because I’m half Black?”

“No, because you play hockey, and she thinks jocks are dumb. My mom isn’t a racist. She’s a snob.”

Now I chuckle. “I guess I’ll take it.”

Diana’s tone grows troubled. “It must be really hard going into certain situations wondering if someone is going to be racist or not.”

“It’s not fun,” I admit. “And it’s weird, because part of me is so fucking lucky for growing up with the privilege I’ve had, and the parents I have. But it’s like sometimes none of that matters when I’m walking in the electronics section of a store and I get security guards following me.”

“Fucking assholes.” Diana growls on my behalf, which is cute.

“Yup. It sucks. But I try to remind myself that I’m more privileged than most, and hold on to that, I guess.” I look over curiously. “Is your mom really going to think I’m dumb?”

“Probably. She doesn’t take athletes seriously. I dated a football player in high school, and every time he came over, she complained she was losing brain cells just being around him. Meanwhile, he’s one of the smartest people I’ve ever met. He’s majoring in mathematics at Notre Dame.”

“She sounds kind of insufferable.”

“She can be.”

Diana hits a pothole, making the Mercedes bounce.

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