Detroit Lions 2015 rookie mini-camp - May 9, 2015

Detroit Lions cornerback Alex Carter (33) prepares to run a drill during the team's rookie minicamp.

(Mike Mulholland | MLive.com)

ALLEN PARK -- Alex Carter had other plans. He was going to finally get together with a girl he had met through social media and had been texting with for weeks. Instead, he called an audible and attended his younger sister Cameron's volleyball game that evening.

It turned out to be the last night of Cameron's life.

Carter, then a high school senior at Briar Woods High School in Ashburn, Virginia, was upstairs in his bedroom when he heard his mother's screams. At first, he thought she might be overreacting to something silly, like a spider. But when he came down to check it out, he saw his sister unconscious on the floor.

Cameron, who suffered from type 1 diabetes, was just 14 years old.

"I thought she was going to be alright," said Carter, now a member of the Detroit Lions' rookie class. "I thought she had just got low. I hugged my dad. He was crying. It was pretty emotional. I left to pick up my sister from school, come back. Even as I was approaching the hospital, I thought she was fine."

At the hospital, Carter was greeted with the grave reality of the situation. His immediate reaction to the news was to run. He didn't get far before the emotions caught him from behind and overwhelmed him.

Just a short distance down the road, he broke down crying.

Cameron's death turned Carter's world on its head. He strongly considered abandoning his commitment to play football at Stanford so he could stay close to his family. But his mother, Renee, wouldn't let him do it. That wouldn't have been what Cameron would have wanted.

"She said Cameron would want you to live your dream -- keep on this path and going forward," Carter said. "It motivated me."

Three years later, Carter is fulfilling his dream, preparing for his first season in the NFL after being selected in the third round of the draft by the Detroit Lions.

Still, his sister is always on his mind.

Carter had planned to honor Cameron's memory with a tattoo, but father Tom -- who played nine seasons with the Washington Redskins, Chicago Bears and Cincinnati Bengals -- strong discouraged it. Even though he's just 20 years old, Carter now talks about naming a future daughter after his sister.

And after signing his first professional contract, a four-year pact worth more than $2 million, Carter has the means to support diabetes research. It's especially important to him because the disease continues to impact his family.

"I don't know exactly what I want to do in the future with that, but it is something, because my other sister also has diabetes," Carter said. "I have two sisters with diabetes and there's not a cure for that right now so whatever I can give back, whatever I can contribute to finding a cure for that."

As for the date Carter spurned to attend Cameron's volleyball game that fateful night, that part of the story has a happy ending.

The girl, Ariana Alston, came to the Carters' home the night Cameron passed away to offer support. It was the first time she and Alex met face-to-face.

Over time, the friendship blossomed into a relationship. Carter took Alston to his high school prom a few months later, and after a three-year, long-distance relationship, the two got engaged late last year.

-- Download the Detroit Lions MLive app for iPhone and Android

-- Follow Justin Rogers on Twitter

-- Like MLive's Detroit Lions Facebook page