Let’s be real, the odds of you winning millions of dollars in the lottery are pretty much 1 in “not-gonna-happen.”

And the chances of your BFF splitting those lotto winnings with you 50/50? Let’s just say those statistics are even more astronomically dismal.

Unless your best friend happens to be a man named Tom Cook!

Tom Cook and Joe Feeney are best friends who made a pinky promise to each other in 1992 when the Powerball first came to Wisconsin.

If either of them won the lottery, they would share their winnings with each other, no questions asked.

When Tom finally hit the jackpot almost 30 years later, he immediately called Joe to share the amazing news.

Joe’s first response was to say, “Are you jerking my bobber?”

The two friends are avid fishermen, and the bobber in this case refers to a lightweight buoy that’s attached to a fishing line. Although it took thousands of tries with weekly $2 bait, they finally caught the biggest fish of them all!

Joe couldn’t believe what he was hearing! In an interview with the Wisconsin lottery Joe outlined the terms of their deal:

“We said whenever the big winner comes, we’re going to split it, so we buy every week … not really thinking it would happen.”

Like many people, they often daydreamed of what they would do with their winnings. At the time, both were still working to support their families.

As for Tom, he’s a standup kind of guy. To him, a handshake means you stick to what you promised!

“A handshake is a handshake, man.”

He realized he was holding onto the golden ticket when he was out having breakfast with his wife. He couldn’t believe his eyes, so he handed it over to another friend, who said, “It looks like you guys won the Powerball.”

Like many who suddenly find themselves with a wad of cash, Tom gave his two-weeks notice at work so he could spend time with his family and travel. Joe, who had already retired from the fire department, didn’t have any extravagant plans for the windfall.

They both opted for a cash payout of $16.7 million. When split two ways, and after having the obligatory taxes reduce their loot by almost a third, they each received $5.7 million.

“We both grew up with not a lot of money, so this is really something special,” Tom told the Milwaukee Sentinel Journal.

Sometimes people forget that there’s always another winner with each and every Powerball that’s sold. The establishment that sells the winning ticket gets an extra bonus, too!

The owners of the Synergy Coop store in Menominee, where Tom bought his ticket, are counting their lucky stars to the tune of $100K.

According to USA Today, the odds of hitting the Powerball’s grand prize is 1 in 292,201,338.

Of course, the real one-in-a-trillion jackpot is being lucky enough to have an enduring, life-long friendship like Tom and Joe’s.

Because in the end, money can’t buy true happiness and friendship.

Watch Tom and Joe talk about their amazing luck in the video below.

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Source: Wisconsin Lottery, USA Today, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel