Terry Schaffer's Secret Lunch with Bret

Terry Schaffer's Secret Lunch with Bret is a concealed meeting at Trumps in September, arranged after Terry Schaffer asks Bret Ellis to come to lunch without telling Debbie Schaffer. What begins as a supposed professional opportunity becomes a probing conversation about Bret’s relationship with Debbie and his attraction to men. Terry’s questions make their shared knowledge explicit, while his request that Bret wear his Buckley uniform and keep the meeting secret gives the encounter a carefully staged, unequal character.

Arrangement and Secrecy

Terry’s assistant, Steven Reinhardt, calls Bret at home on a Monday morning to ask whether he is available for lunch that week. Bret has recently encountered Terry’s wife, Liz, during a drunken outburst, and Steven witnessed Bret responding calmly. Terry’s invitation is presented partly as a reward for that composure and partly as the beginning of a possible script-writing job. Bret is told not to mention the meeting to Debbie, Terry’s daughter and Bret’s girlfriend.

The appointment is set for one o’clock on Wednesday at Trumps, under the name Schaffer. Steven stresses that Bret should come straight from school and remain in his uniform. Bret understands the request as more than convenience: the uniform emphasizes his youth and boyishness, and Terry seems to be constructing a particular image of him. Bret blushes at the implication but agrees, trusting Terry as a successful adult who understands rules he himself is still learning. He leaves Buckley at twelve-thirty without telling anyone.

The Conversation at Trumps

The lunch initially carries the atmosphere of access to Terry’s adult world. Terry speaks casually about the possibility of introducing Bret to writers Bret admires, and Governor Jerry Brown appears at the restaurant and greets Terry. Terry does not introduce Bret. As the restaurant empties, Bret becomes increasingly conscious of the strangeness of being there with a forty-year-old man during the school day.

Terry asks how serious Bret is about Debbie, who began dating him in June. Bret says they are fairly serious and that he wants Debbie to be happy. Terry then asks directly whether Bret likes guys as well. Bret responds evasively, mentioning Richard Gere, and Terry follows by asking whether he finds Thom Wright attractive. Bret answers by turning the question back on Terry. Terry acknowledges that he does and says he is jealous of the time Bret gets to spend with Thom, while noting that Thom’s tastes are probably more limited than Bret’s.

What the Meeting Makes Explicit

The exchange brings into the open something Terry had previously conveyed only through suggestive jokes and innuendo. Bret recognizes that Terry has now confirmed his homosexuality plainly, though Bret remains uncertain about what the disclosure permits or implies. He recalls that Terry had not, to his knowledge, touched any of the young people inappropriately or made an overt move, but Bret’s curiosity and desire to please the adults around him complicate his judgment of the situation.

The secrecy surrounding the lunch links the personal conversation to Terry’s household and to Bret’s public relationship with Debbie. Terry has asked Bret not to tell her about their meeting, and during the conversation Bret raises Liz. The evidence does not resolve the larger questions Bret has about Terry’s marriage or intentions; instead, it shows how disclosure, concealment, and the promised script work together to keep Bret engaged in an arrangement whose terms are set by Terry.

The Departure and Its Consequence

As Bret prepares to leave, Terry suddenly grabs his wrist. The gesture stops Bret and makes the separation physically immediate. Terry then says that Steven will call to arrange a time for them to begin discussing the script Bret is to write. The professional offer remains attached to the private encounter, leaving the lunch suspended between work, confidence, and personal boundary-testing.

The meeting marks a change in their relationship: what had been rumor and implication becomes a direct conversation about same-sex attraction, with Terry steering the questions and Bret responding cautiously. Its secrecy also reinforces the constraints around Bret’s relationships at Buckley. In a school world organized by conventional couplehood and social roles, the lunch creates a private space for recognition but offers no assurance that this recognition can be openly carried into Bret’s life with Debbie or his friendship with Thom.