As Megan Hylton saw the photos of Chris Skinner lying in his hospital bed, she thought back to the time a year ago when the car she was driving rolled over.
"The only thought I was thinking was how fortunate I was," Hylton, who was sober at the time of her accident, said.
On Dec. 16, Skinner, 25, of Radford, Va., visited Paul VI High School in Fairfax to explain to juniors and seniors the dangers of driving drunk. The former athlete now must use a wheelchair to get around. His hands have lost their sense of touch and have curled into question marks as a result of an accident he was in four years ago.
Skinner pointed to the photos taken of him lying in his hospital bed. "Look at that kid who's crippled, lying in his bed with bolts in his head, with tubes in his body," he said. "Do I want this? You don't want this crap.
"I don't want any of you guys to experience what I have experienced," Skinner said. "For the rest of my life, I'm going to be a disabled person in a wheelchair with these little, crippled-up hands.
"You are not invincible," he told the students. When they see reports of other young people who have been killed through drunken driving and other irresponsible behavior, he warned them not just to think, "That poor family, those poor people," he said. "They were all made of the same thing as you, blood and skin and bone, and if you make the wrong decision, you can be broken."
SKINNER TOLD the story of his life, peppering it with humor and pop culture references. He grew up in Franklin, Va., and moved on to Radford University. He failed out of Radford because he partied too much, having what he called the "temporary fun" of being drunk and high. He joined the Army National Guard and worked to be readmitted to school.
Then, on June 10, 2000, he went to a wedding. That morning, "I got out of bed, and I remember I put my feet on the ground for the last time," he said. "I remember walking for the very last time. I took a shower on my own for the very last time."
A friend picked him to drive him to the wedding. As Skinner got into the vehicle, he shook hands with his friend. "That was the last time I ever felt human contact," he said. "I remember it like it was yesterday."
Skinner and his friend were planning on skipping the reception, he said. They didn't want to get drunk, and they had work the next day. After the wedding, he was in his car ready to leave, when another friend told him he had to come to the reception. He couldn't miss it.
Skinner looked up at his audience. "You don't have to do anything you don't want to do," he said. "That doesn't mean you can go home tonight and tell your parents you don't have to do what they say. You know what I mean."
Skinner got to the reception, which took place outside on a beautiful day. Little white ducks swam in pools of water, and hot air balloons floated through the air. "Then my eyes met with the keg of beer," Skinner said. A block of ice sat on top of the keg. "The ice was melting ever so slowly."
The friend he had come with, Skinner said, knew instantly what was going to happen. Skinner was going to get drunk. "Be a good friend. You know each other. Take the dag'gone keys from them," he said.
Skinner sniffled a little and choked back tears as he went on. He did get drunk. He danced and drank and had a good time. His friend, who had stayed sober, came to him and said it was time to leave, but Skinner refused. "I called him a loser and a lot of things I can't say here," he said.
"That loser can still walk. That loser can still open doors for himself," Skinner said. "I know who I'd rather be. I'd rather be him."
When the reception ended, only Skinner and five others remained. "One of my friends says this, 'We can go to my house, it's just two miles away.'"
Skinner got into a truck as a passenger, but the driver was also drunk. He did not wear his seat belt. As the truck rounded the last bend, Skinner was about 700 feet from his destination. "You could see the mailbox to where we were going. You could read the letters," he said. "When I think about how close I was to safety … ."
Skinner was thrown through the window of the vehicle going 45 miles per hour.
NOW IMAGINE this. "You open your eyes, and you are in an all-white room," Skinner said, recalling those first moments of consciousness in the hospital. "Your first thought is to get up, and you can't move. So you are scared, and you try to call out. You can't talk because you've got a hole in your neck."
When the nurse came to him, "I mouthed the words, you can take the straps off me now," he said. There were no straps.
The nurse, beginning to cry herself, looked down at the broken body of 6-foot-1-inch, 180-pound former athlete and soldier. Skinner still remembers her reply. "'Honey, I'm sorry. You've been in a severe car accident and will never walk again. You may never use your arms again,'" he said.
"If you are lucky, this is what happens," Skinner said, looking at his motorized wheelchair. "Come up here afterwards and touch this cold steel, because this is real."
State Sen. Jay O'Brien (R-39th) introduced Skinner and explained what happens to the unlucky. His cousin, Patricia, was killed in an accident when she was 19. She would now be 43.
"What would she be?" O'Brien asked, before expanding the query to all of the teens who have died in auto accidents in recent months. "It's the lost promise. We just don't know what they could have been, who they could have been."
O'Brien looked up at the full auditorium. "Humble yourselves enough and call your folks and ask for a ride home, please."
Skinner survived. He married his physical therapist, Suzanne. He went on to earn a bachelor's degree at Radford, is currently working on a master's, and hopes to be a school counselor. Over the past few years, he has been visiting schools and has spoken to thousands to students. But each time, the speech gets a little more difficult for him. "The more I do it, the more emotional I get because reality sets in," Skinner said. "The longer I sit in this wheelchair, the more real it becomes to me."