Altee Tenpenny reached out for help, but it was too late.

According to his parents and former high school coach, the mentally ill former Alabama running back who died in a car accident last week reached out to loved ones in his final hours and admitted something wasn’t right.

Tenpenny hadn’t spoken to his father in several years prior to answering a text message shortly before his death.

“On the day my son died, I sent him a text,” Derek Tenpenny told AL.com over the weekend after Altee’s funeral. “I was angry about what I had read in the papers, but I always wanted to keep it open. I said, ‘Son, football and college, this ain’t working. I don’t know what it is that you’re running from, but you need to come home so we can fix it.’

“And Altee texted me back. My son texted me back. Instantly. Y’all don’t understand. When you spend years texting and calling, and you don’t get nothing — a minute after I sent my text, my son texted me back. And he said, ‘Yes, sir. When can we meet?'”

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Brad Bolding, Tenpenny’s former head coach at North Little Rock High School, said the troubled 20-year-old seemed shaken during a lengthy phone call and poured out his emotions to him.

“He wanted help,” Bolding said, according to AL.com. “He knew he was out of control. He owned up to things. He always did.”