“Half of Paradise” by James Lee Burke (post 1): How can a man not be sure if he is hearing himself laughing?

There is an intriguing sentence in James Lee Burke’s first novel:

“…J.P. and April picked up their marriage license at the courthouse. He had a fresh supply of powder…and he stayed high all evening. That night they drove to a justice of the peace’s house…J.P. was very high and kept wanting to laugh during the ceremony. He looked at the homely slogans on the wall in the gilt and scrolled frames. He thought he heard himself laughing. The marriage was over and they were sitting in the back seat of the taxi on the way to the hotel…” (1, pp. 281-282).

“He thought he heard himself laughing” doesn’t make sense. How can a man not be sure whether or not he is hearing himself laughing? The only way would be for him to hear laughter in his head that he neither identifies with as being his own nor hears as coming from an outside source, which would probably make it the laughter of his alternate personality.

Drug intoxication evidently made his alternate personality laugh, which J.P.’s regular personality experienced as an urge to laugh.

This is one more example of how symptoms of multiple personality may be camouflaged by drugs and alcohol.

1. James Lee Burke. Half of Paradise. New York, Hachette Books, 1965.

2. Wirt Williams. “On the Tracks to Doom.” The New York Times, March 14, 1965. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1965/03/14/96700209.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0