Surrounded by the sacks of money he hauled around each day, transit worker Aubrey Boyce would often get lost daydreaming how his life would change if the money were all his.
“Sitting in the back of the truck, we’d say to each other, ‘Man, what would I do with all that?’ ” his friend and fellow subway-collection agent, Chris Corulla, told The Post. “We’d say, ‘Do you think our problems would all just disappear?’ ”
Boyce is about to find out.
As winner of the second richest Mega Millions haul in city history, he’ll no longer have to endure the torture of getting his hands dirty with someone else’s cash — and will instead deliver a final load of moneybags right into his bank account.
The soft-spoken Boyce — who won a $133 million jackpot — plans to retire at the age of 49, and will soon leave behind his modest Kew Gardens, Queens, apartment as well.
Wearing khaki pants, a button-down shirt and a pair of shades, the married Boyce appeared with his lawyer — and not his wife — at an obligatory press conference to collect his jumbo check.
“I want to stay the same. I don’t want to go crazy,” Boyce said at the Grand Central Terminal gathering — three weeks after he bought the magic ticket.
“I will probably go on a vacation somewhere warm and go deep-sea fishing,” he said. “I’m going to relax first and think about it later.”
On second thought, he added a moment later, he might get a new car, “but something not too flashy — not like a Mercedes or a Rolls-Royce.”
Boyce bought his $2 ticket at the Shiv Convenience Store in Jamaica and let the computer pick the winning numbers: 25, 27, 35, 38, and 39. The Mega Ball was 28.
Opting for a lump-sum payment of $82.7 million, after taxes he walked away with $56.7 million. It’s the highest payout in the city since Juan Rodriguez, a bankrupt parking-lot attendant also from Queens, won $149 million in 2004 — although Rodriguez’s wife filed for divorce and made off with half the cash.
At New York City Transit, where Boyce worked for the last eight years, he earned $64,472 a year.
“I was in a state of shock,” he said. After reviewing the numbers on the ticket several times, he said his wife took some convincing. “She thought I was making a joke,” he said. “We couldn’t believe I was the winner.”
On the job with the MTA, Boyce would empty cash from MetroCard vending machines in Manhattan, The Bronx and Brooklyn, his partner Corulla said.
Although many riders pay with credit cards, the machines still fill up with huge amounts of cash each day.
The money trains were phased out several years ago, and now the subway relies completely on agents like Boyce to collect the cash and drive it back to headquarters by truck.
“The bags of money sometimes weigh 30, 40 or even 50 pounds,” Corulla said. “And when the truck was full it had more than $115,000 in cash. But after seeing it all day long, most of the time you didn’t even notice it.
“But some days we couldn’t help but dream.”
Boyce’s dreams were never too extravagant, Corulla said.
“He never struck me as the kind of guy that needed money — he didn’t base his life on it,” he said. “Aubrey is a humble guy, very soft-spoken. This could not have happened to a better person.”
Corulla said he and Boyce regularly played the lottery together.
Boyce typically spent around $12 a week on various games.
He and his wife own a one-bedroom apartment in a 12-story co-op. They bought it for $145,000 in 2005.
Neighbors and employees at the co-op spoke highly of the couple and hoped the newly minted millionaire would share the wealth.
“They are very good people and very respectful,” said the building’s porter, Narant Singh. “They’re also very good tippers and I hope they tip us with this money.”
Neighbor Jenna Rianoldo said she already envied Boyce before the lottery.
“Boy, that guy’s got all the luck,” she said. “He had a good job with Transit and now he wins Mega Millions. I wish he’d give me some of that.”
Boyce didn’t argue.
“I am lucky and I believe in God,” he said. “It’s a blessing.”
Like many recent Mega Millionaires, Boyce created a trust to disburse his winnings.
On the advice of his attorney. he waited to claim the prize, hoping the hoopla surrounding the big jackpot would die down.
“But when that didn’t happen, we figured now was as good a time as any,” he said.
Boyce was not the only big winner to come forward yesterday.
Retired NYPD cop William Messam, 55, of Elmhurst, won $1 million in a scratch-off game.
“I asked the retailer, ‘You seeing the same thing I do?’ It couldn’t be real,” the former member of the Finest said.
And what about his future plans?
“I’m pretty low-key. I just plan on taking care of my parents,” he said. However, a “little vacation” to Mexico is also in the works.
Additional reporting by C.J. Sullivan and Ikimulisa Livingston