‘the lack of a husband in this story is so common that it isn’t even mentioned or noticed, and that says more volumes than any dictionary or Siri.’
You realize, don’t you, that some perfectly lovely wives and children get left by husbands and fathers who are selfish, childish, players, etc. What would you have them do? Just grab out at anyone with whiskers so they could say there was a male influence in the house? Sometimes the emotional wreckage left behind makes it difficult to ever entertain the idea of marrying or even dating again. So all these people on their soap box about lack of fathers in the home should be looking at the fathers/husbands.
Why are people assuming there is no husband? My wife had stories like this when my kids were young. At the time I traveled about 30% of the time for business. When traveling internationally, I was sometimes gone nearly 2 weeks. It’s a reach to conclude from this there is no active father.