'The sad story of the cheapest and most expensive eyeliner I've ever bought.'

My love affair with black gel eye liner started about eight years ago.

It was definitely, 100%, unequivocally inspired by The Hills. I liked how Lauren Conrad did her makeup, and I imitated it.

It’s not even that I have any evidence she actually wore gel eye liner. It could’ve been goddamn LIQUID for all I know. It’s just that I tried everything and my eyes looked the most like hers when I wore gel eye liner. And so it began.

As you'd expect, over the years I tried countless products. But the best, of all the ones I ever tried, was Rimmel waterproof gel eye liner. It was perfect. It lasted forever, didn't dry out, never smudged, was easy to remove and the brush never frayed. Oh, that's right, and it was also $12.

I lived a blissful existence without a worry in the world. My favourite eye liner would always be there, I told myself. It was part of me now. We depended on each other.

But then one day...it just wasn't there anymore.

You guys, they discontinued it. Or I bought all of it. This had only happened once before - at my local convenience store when I kept buying red frogs until there were none left. It was heartbreaking. It was unfair. And something had to be done.

I realised about two years ago that I could no longer buy my Rimmel eye liner in Australia. It was gone. So I started ordering it from London. But once shipping was tacked on, it started to become expensive. And one time I didn't read the fine print properly and ended up ordering THREE purple eye liners. So if anyone has a thing for purple eye liner, seriously hit me up.

Then, late last year, I went to Bali. I had (God forbid) RUN OUT OF EYE LINER, so I went into a pharmacy to buy one.

That's when I found it.

It looked exactly like the Rimmel eye liner, but it wasn't. It was called 'Silkygirl.' I had no idea if it would actually be any good, but I took a risk and bought it. Let's be honest, I didn't fully understand the currency, but when I worked it out later, it had only cost me $5 AUD.

That night, I used it.

It was...brilliant. Better than brilliant. For $5 I'd bought myself a gift I profoundly deserved - an eye liner that was just the right consistency and just the right thickness. I felt so much joy, but I knew no one would understand - yet. I had to find a way to bring this beautiful little pot home for everyone to enjoy.

Obviously, I went back later and bought four more. Only four, because I'm heinously cheap and am pretty much incapable of planning for the future in any meaningful way. Because if I knew what I was doing, I would have bought four million. 

But when I got home, I decided I had to write about it. This eye liner was $5. Nothing is $5. I think my coffee this morning was more than $5. So I looked up where I could buy it online, so I could share my secret with everyone else.

I looked.

And I looked.

And I looked.

YOU CAN'T BUY IT ONLINE THERE ARE ONLY PRODUCT REVIEWS.

There's one Indonesian website that sells it but it only delivers to Indonesia - at least that's what I understood from a website written completely in Indonesian.

Is this all some cruel joke??

I bought the cheapest eye liner I've ever bought, which also happened to be brilliant, and now it's turned out to be the most expensive? 

Am I...am I going to have to fly to Bali to get more? How long will three eye liner's last me? Six months? Eight, tops? Should I start planning a convenient Balinese holiday now or...

Look, the moral of this story is that life isn't always fair. But also, if you have a friend going to Bali any time soon, give them $5 and ask them for one thing and one thing only.