Britney Spears isn’t being “Toxic” when it comes to her ex Justin Timberlake.
In a Sunday night post to her Instagram, which has now gone private, the pop star issued an apology for some of the stories featuring Timberlake she included in her memoir, “The Woman in Me” — while also showing love for her former boyfriend’s new music.
“I wanna apologize for some of the things I wrote about in my book. If I offended any of the people I genuinely care about I am deeply sorry,” Spears wrote alongside a video of Timberlake on Thursday’s episode of “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.” “I also wanted to say I am in love with Justin Timberlake’s new song ‘Selfish.’ It is soo good… PS ‘Sanctified is wow too.”
The post came a day after Timberlake debuted his gospel-style song “Sanctified” on “Saturday Night Live,” where he also performed his upcoming album’s lead single, “Selfish.” But perhaps more of note, Spears’ shout-out to Timberlake’s tracks came as her fans have seemingly started a battle for who sang “Selfish” the best.
The day after Timberlake dropped “Selfish” last week, fans rallied to support Spears’ 2011 song of the same name, shooting it to No. 1 on the iTunes charts while the former boy bander’s single sat at No. 3.
Spears’ music videos for her songs “Oops!… I Did It Again” and “I’m a Slave 4 U” also hit the top two spots on iTunes’ music videos chart, while Timberlake’s “Selfish” music video held third place.
The fan-induced battle of the exes seemed to draw from their new or renewed disdain toward Timberlake following the release of Spears’ memoir last year.
In it, the singer revealed personal details about the pair’s three-year relationship, which ended in 2002, including that he urged her to have an abortion — an experience she described as “one of the most agonizing things I have ever experienced in my life.”
“Justin definitely wasn’t happy about the pregnancy. He said we weren’t ready to have a baby in our lives, that we were way too young,” Spears wrote in the book. “I don’t know if that was the right decision. If it had been left up to me alone, I never would have done it.”
Timberlake hasn’t commented on the story, but shortly after the story was made public he temporarily disabled his Instagram comments as Spears’ fans swarmed with hate, which continues today.
That month, Spears made a now-deleted Instagram post saying she didn’t “like the headlines I am reading” and that “most of the book is from 20 years ago … I have moved on.”
She continued, saying, “although some might be offended, [writing this book] has given me closure on all things for a better future. Hopefully I can enlighten people who feel particularly alone in most cases or hurt or misunderstood !!!”