"After attending to the... matters of my second brother and his wife in a few days," Lai Jingshan paused and, after glancing at his daughter Li Mingyue, managed to squeeze out a faint smile, "I'll take you out for a good stroll, as a sort of..."
His words choked off before he could finish, his nose sour with emotion, as he thought of all the ways he had failed his wife.
"Don't worry, have some soup first, it's going cold."
Lai Jingshan nodded, "Okay."
But he had hardly taken a couple of sips of soup when he seemed to remember something and looked steadily at his wife.
"Jingshan, what is it, is it..."
"Find the wooden box I gave you when we got married tomorrow morning, the small purple sandalwood one, no wait, go now, find it now."
"Oh, okay, I'll go now."
"Forget it, just wait for me in the bedroom, I'll be up in a bit," Lai Jingshan added.
