The period of totality is the only phase when you do not need to use protective eyewear. You would be able to safely look directly at the eclipsed Sun, as long as your timing is precise.
https://eclipse.aas.org/eye-safety
It's during the partial/annular/penumbral phases when you use the protective eyewear, and those are lasting a couple of hours on each side.
But even protected viewing should be curtailed to a couple of minutes at a time.
"Let me potentially permanently damage my eyes to save 20 bucks".
How are you potentially damaging your eyes? If it’s totality looking through them is a waste of time (you won’t see anything) and outside that range you have hours to pass them around. The sharing part has no impact.
100% totality means there is nothing to damage your eyes. I stood exactly on the line a few years ago and we had over a minute to look at it without glasses. Don't be 2 seconds early or late putting the glasses on though. I stopped looking many seconds early to ensure I wasn't staring up unprotected when the sun started showing again. There was an app that talked through the stages with exact timings and a countdown clock which worked perfectly.