After the last round of searching for Black was over the all clear was given by the Head Mater and school resumed to its normal routine. With less restriction, Tessa and the Twins could finally escape from professors without receiving detention.
"When's your last meeting with Snape," said Fred to Tessa and Lee.
"Tonight," said Tessa happily with the sweet relief of freedom by tomorrow.
"It's with a couple of Seventh years, but it should be fun," said Lee excitedly.
Tessa and Lee would be cleaning pots and testing first years' potions for the last time, and Tessa couldn't be happier. After Flint's stunt at the Quidditch match, he was also in Snape's detention. He always winked at Tessa while motioning obscene gestures with the way he would clean dirty cauldrons.
"How does it feel, Tess?" George asked with a smirk.
"Marvelous. If it wasn't for Lee, I would've been converted by the end of the month," said Tessa sarcastically. Fred and George laughed and pushed through the crowd waiting for lunch at the entrance of the Great Hall.
"Stop pressing too hard you'll scratch the bronze," said Snape with a crisp voice towards his one of his students.
"Can't get it out," said the Slytherin boy struggling to get some burnt goop out of the cauldron, after a first year heated the potion at too high of a temperature earlier that day.
Snape snatched the cauldron out the boy's hands and plopped it onto Tessa's desk. Tessa sighed with annoyance, and picked up the streaky cauldron. She scrubbed away some of the thicker burnt pieces of goo with a tooth brush and picked up a soapy salve with a soft sponge to buff out the rest.
Snape looked mildly impressed for a split second and frowned again.
"Five points to Gryffindor; I suppose," said Snape lazily after Tessa grabbed a wet cloth and dish soap to fully clean the cauldron. A few of the Seventh year boys grumbled in annoyance.
Snape paced back and forth in the middle of the room like he had somewhere to be and abruptly stopped in the middle. "It would be a great opportunity to have a contest between Gryffindor and Slytherin. 50 points to the winner", said Snape after some of the Slytherin boy's paces were getting much slower after cleaning their first cauldron, and wasting everyone else's time.
"That's ridiculous," snapped Tessa at the unfair advantage.
"Ten points from Gryffindor," snapped back Snape in response.
"What for?" replied Tessa with vivid annoyance.
"Do you want to make it twenty," retorted Snape shrewdly.
"No, Professor," said Tessa after a pause.
With Flint at the same count as Tessa and Lee, both Houses were tied at sixteen cauldrons.
"This is stupid", mumbled Tessa to Lee who nodded his head quickly in agreement.
"Stop complaining, or I will have to take more," snapped Snape in response. Lee and Tessa snorted and continued to scrub the last few cauldrons left.
After Lee placed his freshly cleaned cauldron on the floor, Tessa looked up to see two cauldrons left. Flint already grabbed one and tried to sneak the other one to a nearly finished peer to his right. Tessa, immediately, accio-ed the cauldron to her, before Flint could grab the edge of it; Flint whipped around and looked for Tessa's wand in her hands.
"Pro-Professor she's cheatin'," said one of the boys after flinching from seeing a flying cauldron in his peripheral vision. Professor Snape whirled around and faced the group.
He looked a Tessa and over to the students bags that still had each of the students wands lying on top.
"Did she use a wand," said Snape to the Slytherin.
"What?" replied the Boy. Snape slowly stood up and walked over to their section.
"Did. She," said Snape slowly. "Use…. A wand." The boy began to stutter visibly confused at seeing Tessa's wand still on her bag.
"N-n-no Professor," said the boy.
"Then fifty points to Gryffindor," stated Snape annoyingly.
Marcus mumbled profanities and reprimanded his House for losing to two "fucking" people, Snape looked at the small sand timer on his desk.
"Jordan. Thornhill," commanded Snape.
"Yes, Professor," said the two in unison.
"Finish cleaning this filth," said Snape pointing at some of the the Slytherin boys' streaky cauldrons.
He escorted Flint and the boys out and turned towards Tessa and Lee. "A professor will be down here to make their rounds every ten minutes, so behave," said Snape and shut the door with a bang.
"Shit," said Lee after the door was closed.
Five minutes into their cleaning, the door slowly creaked open to reveal the twins.
"Heee-llo," said the twins in unison as the shut the door behind them.
"Helping hand?" Tessa asked politely and George shrugged.
"We might," said George.
"For a price," said Fred smiling.
"And what might that be," said Lee jokingly.
"Help us with ours of course," said Fred.
"Cleaning Filch's closets in the dungeons," said George with a smirk.
"And trapping them," finished Fred slyly. Tessa and Lee smiled and looked at each other.
"Deal," they stated and threw clothes to Fred and George.
Within 15 minutes, all of the cauldrons were squeaky clean. There was a slight knock on the potion's classroom door. Thankfully, it was Professor McGonagall was the first to make her rounds in the dungeons as she opened the door to see four of her students, instead of two inside.
"Oh well, I guess this is no surprise. I see you have finished cleaning the cauldrons," Said the Professor while observing the freshly cleaned room.
"Yess, Professor. May we work together and help Fred and George with their spring cleaning?" Tessa asked politely.
"I see no harm in helping," stated McGonagall as she made her to the door and strode out of the classroom.
"Now that this is out of the way," said Tessa. "Let's get started."
They walked to the next closet on the twins' list. They opened the door and the putrid smell of cat piss wafted the air.
"Merlin's beard," said Lee as he covered the lower half of his face with his left arm.
"Disgusting," mumbled Tessa as she inspected the damage. Tessa dropped her bag to the wall and pulled out her wand. With a flick of her wrist, the cleaning objects sprung to life and began cleaning the dusty room by their selves. Lee laughed with astonishment and Tessa smiled visibly proud of herself.
"Beauty and the Beast," said Tessa point at the moving brooms, mops, and bucks.
"What?" George said confused.
"Beauty and Beast," stated Tessa again with more passion.
"I don't—," began George lightly.
"—We watched it together. Over the Summer," said Tessa with a laugh and slight annoyance at the missed reference. "Muggle movie with the bewitched Prince and—, "Tessa's voice slowly faded as Lee and Fred moved on the next closet to get a head start.
"What is Beauty and the Beast," mumbled Lee after a moment of silence.
"Don't even," said Fred with a laugh and opened the door to the next closet. Fortunately it was clean, and Fred gave Lee a couple of stinks bombs to plant in the mouse hole at the bottom left corner of the tiny cupboard. Tessa and George came up five minutes later.
"Oh, so the real beast is the hunter," said George.
"Yes," Tessa laughed and pulled her wand out again.
"This one's clean," shouted Lee as he shut the door. All four walked together and planted traps at the next few closets until they were all spotless and set with a trap to go off when school ends.
"He never cleans the dungeons 'til Summer," said Fred cheerfully.