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He had moved back to his childhood house for his year-long residency because the program did not pay a lot in monetary compensation.  Instead, the residency rewarded him with the experience he would need to be a successful dentist going forward.  He had decided to save the money he would have had to spend on a tiny apartment for the year for a down payment on a house or condo next year.  So after being away for eight years, four spent in Boston at Tufts and four at Temple University Dental School in Philadelphia, he had moved back in with his mother and his stepfather.
    He had been wary about moving ba ck in with his mom and Steve at first because he truly believed that you could never go home again.  That once you were out, you were out for good.  That your parents wanted to get on with their lives and didn’t want you back.  But his mother and Steve had accepted him with open arms, and the transition had gone more smoothly than anticipated.   Since he had come home relatively often during his college and post-graduate years for holidays and the like, his parents hadn’t touched his bedroom.  His mother assured him, with a sly smile, that his room would only be turned into the dedicated sewing room she so desperately wanted once he was absolutely gone for good, which wouldn’t be until he was married.  Jamie’s biggest worry about moving back home was that, despite the DMD after his name, the three of them would slip back into the comfortable-yet-strict parent-rebellious teenager relationship that had existed during his high school years.  He couldn’t begin to count the number of times his mom and step-dad had uttered “ This is our house and you’ll live by our rules, young man, or you’ll find another place to live. ”  
    H is worries, though, had proved unfounded. Despite the fact that his mom and Steve were still the parents and he the child, they quickly afforded him all of the respect and privacy he could have wanted.  Things had been shaky for a couple of weeks as everyone acclimated to the new dynamic, but once his mother and Steve came to terms with the fact that their little boy was now an adult, and a doctor at that, a balance was struck, one they all could accept and live with comfortably.  Home felt like home, and he couldn’t be happier.
    Jamie made his way up the walkway, fished his keys from his bag , and unlocked the front door.  He slipped into the house as quietly as possible, pulling the door closed behind him.  He stepped out of his shoes and was no more than four feet into the foyer when the smell of freshly baked pastries wafted out from the kitchen, tickling his nostrils.  The sweet aroma was accompanied by the equally delightful voice of his mother as she sang along with the radio.  Jamie followed his nose and ears into the kitchen, where his mother stood at the counter, her back to him, working a pie crust against the sides of round tin.  She wore a white baker’s apron, and her brunette hair was pulled in a ponytail to keep loose strands from getting into her face as she worked.  A fresh pan of sugar cookies cooled under a small window to her left.  The song on her lips as she moved was Janice Joplin’s immortal “Mercedes Benz”. 
    The scene was so peaceful, so perfect, so Americana, it could have been immortalized in a Normal Rockwell painting.
    “Hey mom,” Jamie said, dropping his bag on the kitchen table.  He walked over to her and kissed her gently on her cheek.
    “You never kiss me when you get home anymore,” Leslie Whitman said, a smile on her face.  “You must want something.”
    “Smelled the cookies,” Jamie admitted.  He reached out to take one but was thwarted by a well-timed blow from a batter-covered wooden spoon.  He rapidly w ithdrew his bruised hand, a look of mock horror on his face.  “Not cool,” he said.
    Leslie turned to her son.  She was a petite woman, no more than five-foot-four, and Jamie towered over her.  But she had