diff --git a/distributed/shuffle/_scheduler_plugin.py b/distributed/shuffle/_scheduler_plugin.py
index 0a511145bc..048fdfb310 100644
--- a/distributed/shuffle/_scheduler_plugin.py
+++ b/distributed/shuffle/_scheduler_plugin.py
@@ -115,10 +115,14 @@ def get(self, id: ShuffleId, worker: str) -> ToPickle[ShuffleRunSpec]:
 
     def get_or_create(
         self,
-        spec: ShuffleSpec,
+        # FIXME: This should never be ToPickle[ShuffleSpec]
+        spec: ShuffleSpec | ToPickle[ShuffleSpec],
         key: str,
         worker: str,
     ) -> ToPickle[ShuffleRunSpec]:
+        # FIXME: Sometimes, this doesn't actually get pickled
+        if isinstance(spec, ToPickle):
+            spec = spec.data
         try:
             return self.get(spec.id, worker)
         except KeyError:
diff --git a/distributed/shuffle/_worker_plugin.py b/distributed/shuffle/_worker_plugin.py
index bc8b1f3d4d..f41c9b5dfd 100644
--- a/distributed/shuffle/_worker_plugin.py
+++ b/distributed/shuffle/_worker_plugin.py
@@ -218,7 +218,7 @@ async def _get_or_create_shuffle(
         if shuffle is None:
             shuffle = await self._refresh_shuffle(
                 shuffle_id=spec.id,
-                spec=ToPickle(spec),
+                spec=spec,
                 key=key,
             )
 
@@ -239,7 +239,7 @@ async def _refresh_shuffle(
     async def _refresh_shuffle(
         self,
         shuffle_id: ShuffleId,
-        spec: ToPickle,
+        spec: ShuffleSpec,
         key: str,
     ) -> ShuffleRun:
         ...
@@ -247,10 +247,11 @@ async def _refresh_shuffle(
     async def _refresh_shuffle(
         self,
         shuffle_id: ShuffleId,
-        spec: ToPickle | None = None,
+        spec: ShuffleSpec | None = None,
         key: str | None = None,
     ) -> ShuffleRun:
-        result: ShuffleRunSpec
+        # FIXME: This should never be ToPickle[ShuffleRunSpec]
+        result: ShuffleRunSpec | ToPickle[ShuffleRunSpec]
         if spec is None:
             result = await self.worker.scheduler.shuffle_get(
                 id=shuffle_id,
@@ -258,14 +259,12 @@ async def _refresh_shuffle(
             )
         else:
             result = await self.worker.scheduler.shuffle_get_or_create(
-                spec=spec,
+                spec=ToPickle(spec),
                 key=key,
                 worker=self.worker.address,
             )
-        # if result["status"] == "error":
-        # raise RuntimeError(result["message"])
-        # assert result["status"] == "OK"
-
+        if isinstance(result, ToPickle):
+            result = result.data
         if self.closed:
             raise ShuffleClosedError(f"{self} has already been closed")
         if shuffle_id in self.shuffles:
@@ -287,7 +286,6 @@ async def _(
                         extension._runs_cleanup_condition.notify_all()
 
                 self.worker._ongoing_background_tasks.call_soon(_, self, existing)
-
         shuffle: ShuffleRun = result.spec.create_run_on_worker(
             result.run_id, result.worker_for, self
         )
diff --git a/distributed/shuffle/tests/test_shuffle.py b/distributed/shuffle/tests/test_shuffle.py
index 0e73cd5efd..4e62952d21 100644
--- a/distributed/shuffle/tests/test_shuffle.py
+++ b/distributed/shuffle/tests/test_shuffle.py
@@ -23,7 +23,7 @@
 dd = pytest.importorskip("dask.dataframe")
 
 import dask
-from dask.distributed import Event, Nanny, Worker
+from dask.distributed import Event, LocalCluster, Nanny, Worker
 from dask.utils import stringify
 
 from distributed.client import Client
@@ -187,6 +187,28 @@ async def test_basic_integration(c, s, a, b, lose_annotations, npartitions):
     await check_scheduler_cleanup(s)
 
 
+@pytest.mark.parametrize("processes", [True, False])
+@gen_test()
+async def test_basic_integration_local_cluster(processes):
+    async with LocalCluster(
+        n_workers=2,
+        processes=processes,
+        asynchronous=True,
+        dashboard_address=":0",
+    ) as cluster:
+        df = dask.datasets.timeseries(
+            start="2000-01-01",
+            end="2000-01-10",
+            dtypes={"x": float, "y": float},
+            freq="10 s",
+        )
+        c = cluster.get_client()
+        out = dd.shuffle.shuffle(df, "x", shuffle="p2p")
+        x, y = c.compute([df, out])
+        x, y = await c.gather([x, y])
+        dd.assert_eq(x, y)
+
+
 @pytest.mark.parametrize("npartitions", [None, 1, 20])
 @gen_cluster(client=True)
 async def test_shuffle_with_array_conversion(c, s, a, b, lose_annotations, npartitions):