OXFORD – Penny Littlefield has seen her husband for only two and a half years of their four-year marriage.

An Army reservist with the 94th Military Police Company, Reggie Littlefield, 39, was deployed to Bosnia. Then to the Middle East. The Army extended his tour twice – once just hours before he was supposed to board a plane home.

“That really killed me,” Penny said. “I was just like, Why?'”

Now, after so long apart, Littlefield and his wife may soon be reunited. The 94th Military Police Company is coming home.

As soon as its members can get a ride.

The Army plane that was set to fly the unit’s 150 soldiers to Fort Drum, N.Y., had mechanical problems this week. The soldiers were grounded in Kuwait.

After years of deployments and extensions, the 94th’s return has been delayed again. Officials say the unit will leave the Middle East today. It is expected to arrive in New York tonight.

“I can’t wait,” Penny said. “It’s been a long 20 months.”

Anxiety

Penny last saw her husband in September. He was allowed two weeks leave for the birth of their first child.

Since then, Reggie has seen his daughter only in snapshots. He’s bonded with his new family, who live in Oxford, through phone calls and e-mail messages.

When Reggie’s deployment in Iraq was extended in April, Penny was heartbroken. The couple learned about the extension seven hours before Reggie was scheduled to fly home.

Now so close to a homecoming once again, she is anxious.

When the couple talked Tuesday, Reggie promised he’d be in New York the next time he called. But when Penny heard from him Wednesday afternoon, he was still in Kuwait.

He was waiting for the plane.

“My anxiety level is so high,” Penny said.

She wasn’t alone.

Debra Whipple’s son, Jeremiah Ayotte, is a gunner with the 94th. She talked to her son Wednesday as he waited for word on his plane.

She was angry at the additional delay, scared that the Army would return the unit to Iraq if the soldiers are idle too long.

“I’m afraid they’re going to say, Well, they’re just sitting there, send them back,'” said Whipple.

Her son has celebrated his 26th and 27th birthdays overseas, she said. She wants him to see his 28th in Maine.

In their civilian lives, Reggie Littlefield, Ayotte and another member of the 94th, Joe Rawls, work together as correctional officers at the Androscoggin County Jail.

Pictures of the three men hang next to yellow ribbons on a wall of the jail. Their co-workers also anxiously await their return.

“They’ve gone beyond their duty calls,” said Capt. John Lebel, the jail administrator. “I applaud them all.”

Based in Londonderry, N.H., the 94th was sent to Bosnia for nine months in 2000. About a year and a half after returning, the unit was deployed to the Middle East. In Iraq since April 2003, the unit has escorted supply convoys.

The reservists were scheduled to come home in December 2003, but their tour was extended to April. The day they were supposed to leave, their tour was extended for another 120 days.

Family members were outraged. Their complaints drew the attention of Defense Department officials and U.S. Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins.

When the 94th Military Police Company arrives in Fort Drum, the reservists will go through several days of meetings and debriefings. Officials expect them to return to New Hampshire early next week.

They will be reunited with their families there.

Lebel plans to be there with a contingent of county employees. He hopes to get permission to take some police cars down, lights going and all.

Whipple and her family will be there. And so will Penny Littlefield and her family.

They don’t know exactly when. They just hope it’s soon.

“He’s alive,” Whipple said. “I want him home that way.”