The Eye Cream That Made Me Actually Believe In Eye Cream

When following up even the most ludicrous falsehood with "believe me" is enough to get you elected president, you know you're facing a full-fledged war on truth. But scams have been preying on the unsuspecting public since long before lying became a national pastime — unfamiliar phone numbers insisting that they're your credit-card company, pyramid schemes that promise riches and leave you nearly destitute with a stockpile of 300 pairs of ugly leggings nobody wants, the Fyre Festival.

Until recently, I might have lumped eye cream in with all the other things that people will try to bamboozle you into wasting your money on that you don't actually need. I'll come to bat for an expensive yet effective moisturizer any day of the week, but how can you possibly justify spending the same amount of money on a small jar of cream that is only meant to be used on the half-moon area beneath your eyeballs? You just can't trust anyone — except, perhaps, for Sunday Riley.

To clarify: I do not know the woman personally, but I do know and love every product that's come out of her eponymous brand. So in spite of my uncompromisingly anti-eye cream belief system, I thought I'd give her new one a chance — the same way I usually avoid anything involving Adam Sandler, but sat through The Meyerowitz Stories because I like Noah Baumbach movies. I found that film largely underwhelming, but the Auto Correct Brightening and Depuffing Eye Contour Cream has made a believer out of me.

This lightweight, fragrance-free cream is packed with caffeine and Brazilian ginseng root to reduce dark circles and puffiness; horse chestnut and an unusual flowering herb called acmella oleracea (also known as "electric buttons," for the way it makes your mouth tingle when used in food) to smooth fine lines; antioxidant-rich lutein to strengthen the fragile skin in the eye area; and cocoa butter, Shea butter, watermelon rind extract, and sodium PCA to condition, hydrate, and plump.

Which sounds all well and good — but reduced crow's feet and a newfound brightness (where hollow-looking dark circles used to be) speak louder than an ingredients list on the back of a box. I'm not lying when I say that, two weeks later, my undereyes have never looked smoother. Believe me.

Sunday Riley Auto Correct Brightening and Depuffing Eye Contour Cream, $65, available at Sephora.