At the age of thirty-five, I finally did it.
After decades of surviving on instant noodles for dinner and overtime, I had finally reached the promised land.
The resting place. The finish line. The holy grail of all overworked souls.
Retirement.
Not the luxurious kind where you lounge on a yacht, sipping wine and collecting ex-wives. No, I mean the peaceful kind. The real dream.
Just me, no noise, and absolutely no one who uses phrases like "let's circle back."
I bought a small cottage out in the countryside. It wasn't much. Just some creaky wood, a leaky roof, and an apple orchard that looked like it had personally given up sometime during the Cold War.
But to me? It was paradise.
I had everything I needed.
A working kettle. A chair so perfectly overused that it molded to my backside like we were friends with benefits in a past life.
And a dog named Bento, who snored louder than most engines and judged me harder than an Asian parent with unrealistically high expectations.
But more than anything, more than the coffee, the peace, or the suspiciously well-read dog—there were no alarms, no emails, and no meetings about meetings.
This was Day One of my new life.
The beginning of peace. The dawn of freedom. The prologue to the greatest nap of all time. Yes, I'm being dramatic. I earned it, so deal with it.
I woke up naturally, to the sound of birds chirping instead of the raging alarm of a phone. Then I proceeded to make three stacks of pancakes. I dropped a bottle a syrup on it.
Diabetes? My foot.
I brewed actual, honest-to-goodness real coffee. Not the kind that tastes like burnt printer paper and sadness.
And then, I stepped out onto the porch with Bento trailing behind me like a retired war general who had seen too much.
The morning air was crisp and clean. The sky was so blue it felt like the universe had finally decided to try art.
I sank into my chair with a sigh so deep that my bones relaxed.
'Freedom, baby, freedom.'
Bento flopped down beside me like a fluffy emotional support carpet. I sipped my coffee slowly, one sip at a time. This was life, the real life.
No deadlines. No rent. No, Susan from accounting with her passive-aggression and 46 unread emails marked "Urgent."
Just me. My pancakes. My dog. And the sweet, unbroken silence of a life well-escaped.
I looked around at the orchard, the crooked little fence, the birds flying by like they were on vacation, and let out a contented breath and whispered, "This… this is exactly what I dreamed of."
And then the universe, in its infinite sense of humor, said:
"Haha, no it isn't."
I heard something like a soft hum.
I sat up a little with my eyes narrowing. The sound grew louder and meaner with time. It was like metal grinding and tires screeching.
Then, over the hill, it appeared—A white delivery truck.
Old and rusty, tearing down the dirt road like it had just gotten dumped and was trying to take someone with it.
I stared at it.
It stared back. Or maybe that was the cracked headlight. Hard to tell.
"Wait—what?" I blinked. "Is this a dream? Is this karma for microwaving fish in the break room that one time?"
The truck did not slow down. It did not swerve. It did not stop.
Bento opened one eye as he looked at the oncoming vehicular apocalypse, and then rolled over like he was saying, This is above my pay grade bro.
I stood up still holding my coffee like it was going to protect me from blunt force trauma.
I took one step back, tripped over the porch step, and fell into the grass like a sack of unresolved trauma.
The truck bore down.
I looked up and saw my life flash before my eyes—and honestly, it was 90% meetings and instant noodles.
Then I saw it.
The bumper. The sticker. It read:
"WE DELIVER FAST."
And I kid you not, I actually laughed for half a second.
Because, of course. Of course, this would happen. On Day One. After all of it.
And just before impact, with my pancakes still warm and my dog not even pretending to help, I shouted—
"NOOO! MY RETIREMENT!"
Then everything went black as a final thought came into my mind
'Maybe I should've learned how to fight trucks.'