MARK Parry clutched his son tightly and beamed a smile that spoke a thousand words.

No more patrols and no more explosive devices. He was no longer Rifleman Parry – he was Dad.

“I just missed Luca lots. You can’t really describe it,” he told the Echo at Beachley Barracks in South Wales, as he held up his son. "I’m just looking forward to taking him to school and playing with his toys.”

Mark was one of 30 TA soldiers stepping off a bus to meet relatives who cried and cheered in the darkness.

The TA troops had spent six months serving in Afghanistan with the regulars of 1 Rifles and six of them were based at Poole and Dorchester. Rifleman Parry is a car sprayer and panel beater from Southbourne who has now been to a warzone.

His colleague and former Blandford resident Lance Corporal Jonathan McKinlay was killed in September.

“In a way you try and put it behind you,” said the 29-year-old, when asked about it.

“But it’s always in the back of your mind.”

His girlfriend Jeanne Rimes, 33, deputy manager at the Savoy Hotel, read Mark’s words of tribute in the news.

“When I saw Jonathan was serving with him, it was too close to home – way too close to home,” she said.

Their four-year-old son Luca asked after his dad every day and dreamed about him constantly. Jeanne said: “When Mark came home for R&R and had to leave again, I think that broke Mark’s heart, because Luca is at a great age.”

The couple have been together for nearly 10 years.

But meeting up again can also be nerve-wracking because families and soldiers go through a great deal in those six months and then have to reconnect.

Just before the bus arrived, Jeanne said: “I am excited but at the same time quite nervous for him because of what he has been through.”

She spent the past six months avoiding the news and feeling her heart beat “a million miles per hour” every time someone in a suit came to the door.

Jeanne and around 70 other family members were there for the homecoming, as was their TA commanding officer Lt Col Tim House from Dorchester.

He said they had stood “shoulder to shoulder” with their regular counterparts, some of them carrying out the most demanding of tasks – leading patrols with the Vallon metal detectors.

The soldiers had been in small patrol bases and checkpoints around Nahr-e Sarj, in the east of central Helmand.

Rifleman Jonathan Spriggs, 22, from Charlton Down in Dorchester, said: “At one point in my checkpoint, due to R&R and casualties, we were down to about four hours’ sleep a night.

“That was for about two months.”

Rifleman Matt Berry from Strouden Park in Bournemouth came home on an earlier flight and has now deployed twice.

Despite the dangers, all the men say they are glad to have gone through the experience.

Lt Findlay Guerin, 28, an engineer with QinetiQ drills at Dorchester, said: “I think the most enjoyable part is when you are on patrol. There’s that adrenaline rush that you get.

“If you look at people who do adventurous activities, this is an extreme version of that.”

What would Jeanne say if Mark told her he was going again? “I would like a really good therapist!” she laughed.

“I would be devastated if he was going away again, but I would support him in every way.”