Currently the app seems to be considering the home page and the articles as different levelled views in the app. This ticket proposes an alternative in which they are considered at the same level of view. The Firefox browser considers it's home page at the same level of the web pages and would serve as an example for this suggestion.

Current workflow (roughly)

• Open the app
• Search for an article
• Read through the article
• If you need to get to the Home page for some reason (Explore feed, History, My lists or Nearby), use the Close button in the article
• If you need to get back to the article from the home page, tap the Show tabs icon and tap the current tab
• If you create a new tab, the Today's featured article is shown
• If you close all the tabs, the Show tabs icon is not visible

The alternative solution to the above workflow requires the following changes in the app,

1. Show the App's home page whenever a new tab is created
2. Avoid the No tabbed situation by always having on tab alive (it makes sense as the home page is shown every time a tab is created)
3. Remove the Close icon from the article view
4. Possibly, show the Show tabs icon in the My Lists, History and Nearby views too.

The above changes result in the Home page of the app and the articles being considered at the same level.

New workflow (roughly)

• Open the app
• Search for an article
• Read through the article
• If you need to get to the Home page for some reason (Explore feed, History, My lists or Nearby), create a new tab
• If you need to get back to the article from any where not only from the home page just switch back to the tab
• If you create a new tab, the App's Home page is shown
• If you close all the tabs, the Show tabs icon is visible with one active tab

Firefox browser - an analogy
The Firefox browser could be seen as an analogy for the proposed solution to some extent.

• In the Firefox browser, whenever you create a new tab, the home page is shown [1] with the sub default sub-tabs ( Top-sites, History and Bookmarks)
• You could navigate between them easily by swiping or tapping on their titles
• There is no way to have a No-tabbed state as there is no special home page to be displayed when there are no tabs

Screen shots of Firefox browser

• Screen shot of the browser showing it's home page

• Screen shot of the browser in another sub-tab in the home page

Notes
[1] : Until you customise it to show something else.