ABERDEEN, MD—A Harford County man who bought a Maryland Lottery instant ticket and gave it to his wife to scratch thought she was pranking him when she said it was a $1 million winner.

She was telling the truth. Now they’re looking at retiring in about seven years, said the winner and his wife, who visited the Lottery Winner’s Circle after claiming the windfall.

Their journey to good fortune started when he was having car troubles. The player, who is going by the alias “Corbin Martin,” a moniker that has meaning for his family members, needed to check on the status of work being done on his car. The Aberdeen resident borrowed his mother’s car to drive to the car repair facility but noticed the tires were low on air.

“Corbin Martin” made a pit stop at the Royal Farms store at 3710 Churchville Road in Aberdeen, put air in the tires and decided to get something to drink. After buying a soda, he had $20 in his pocket so he decided to buy a $20 MONOPOLY X100 instant ticket. The scratch-off from the Maryland Lottery is licensed by Scientific Games, LLC.

A casual Lottery player, “Corbin Martin” usually buys Powerball and Mega Millions tickets.

“I’m not a big scratch-offs player,” he said.

The issue that put his car in the shop was part of a series of minor calamities, so he didn’t think that scratching off the instant ticket was going to bring a big win.

“I brought it home and gave it to my wife. I said, ‘You’re lucky. Give us some scratch-off luck,’” he recalled.

He left the room and, at her leisure, his wife scratched off the instant ticket. Now, it’s often the case that identifying a winning match requires a careful eye, but not so this time. The second of the five “Winning Numbers” listed across the top of the play area was 40, and directly below that in the second spot of the first line of “Your Numbers” was also a 40. Below that number, in bold, was a $1,000,000 prize. She knew instantly they were millionaires.

She took the scratch-off to her husband and said it was a million-dollar winner.

“I thought it was a prank,” he recalled, adding that when he took a look, all doubts were immediately gone. “This is unbelievable. What a feeling!”

The two recently purchased a house and they will use the bulk of their winnings to pay it off early and bring retirement within reach in about seven years. They’ll also consider building a house in the Philippines.