She tried a lash lift and tint first, because it sounded like the "no makeup makeup" option. That was $85 and an hour of sitting still in a weird chair. But the tech used a pad that was too big for her eye, and three days later her lashes were bent up at weird angles, like she'd just rolled out of bed. She had to put on mascara to make them look normal, which defeated the whole point.

Then she went the DIY route with a $14 lash kit from the drugstore. The little clusters looked fine in the box, but the glue turned gray and tacky, and one eye came out clumpy and spiky while the other looked half empty. By the time she finished, she had three spider legs on one side and a bald spot on the other. They felt heavy, and in the bathroom light they looked exactly like the fake lashes she was trying to avoid.

Finally came magnetic lashes with that thick liner. The liner went on so dark and heavy that she looked like she'd used a Sharpie, it smudged under her eyes by the afternoon, and one lash flipped up in the middle of a meeting. "I don't want to look like someone glued a costume to my face," she says. "I just want people to think I woke up like this."